Alfonse D’Amato, former Senator for New York

D’Amato was a senator from New York and was a Republican. He served from 1981 to 1998.

Photo of Sen. Alfonse D’Amato [R-NY, 1981-1998]

Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

D’Amato is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the Senate in 1998 positioned according to our ideology score (left to right) and our leadership score (leaders are toward the top).

The chart is based on the bills D’Amato sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 5, 1993 to Oct 21, 1998. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

D’Amato was the primary sponsor of 54 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

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Does 54 not sound like a lot? Very few bills are ever enacted — most legislators sponsor only a handful that are signed into law. But there are other legislative activities that we don’t track that are also important, including offering amendments, committee work and oversight of the other branches, and constituent services.

We consider a bill enacted if one of the following is true: a) it is enacted itself, b) it has a companion bill in the other chamber (as identified by Congress) which was enacted, or c) if at least about half of its provisions were incorporated into bills that were enacted (as determined by an automated text analysis, applicable beginning with bills in the 110^th Congress).

Bills Sponsored

Issue Areas

D’Amato sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Government Operations and Politics (19%) Commerce (17%) Finance and Financial Sector (13%) Law (13%) International Affairs (10%) Economics and Public Finance (9%) Crime and Law Enforcement (9%) Foreign Trade and International Finance (8%)

Recently Introduced Bills

D’Amato recently introduced the following legislation:

View All » | View Cosponsors »

Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

Voting Record

Missed Votes

From Jan 1981 to Oct 1998, D’Amato missed 184 of 6,610 roll call votes, which is 2.8%. This is worse than the median of 1.9% among the lifetime records of senators serving in Oct 1998. The chart below reports missed votes over time.

We don’t track why legislators miss votes, but it’s often due to medical absenses, major life events, and running for higher office.

Show the numbers...

Time Period	Votes Eligible	Missed Votes	Percent	Percentile
1981 Jan-Mar	57	1	1.8%	50^th
1981 Apr-Jun	125	6	4.8%	77^th
1981 Jul-Sep	122	3	2.5%	40^th
1981 Oct-Dec	193	20	10.4%	70^th
1982 Feb-Mar	79	6	7.6%	73^rd
1982 Apr-Jun	127	2	1.6%	37^th
1982 Jul-Sep	177	4	2.3%	43^rd
1982 Oct-Dec	86	0	0.0%	0^th
1983 Feb-Mar	54	5	9.3%	72^nd
1983 Apr-Jun	122	2	1.6%	34^th
1983 Jul-Sep	92	0	0.0%	0^th
1983 Oct-Nov	103	5	4.9%	47^th
1984 Jan-Mar	45	0	0.0%	0^th
1984 Apr-Jun	144	11	7.6%	72^nd
1984 Jul-Sep	68	5	7.4%	66^th
1984 Oct-Oct	34	2	5.9%	50^th
1985 Jan-Mar	22	1	4.5%	68^th
1985 Apr-Jun	116	1	0.9%	27^th
1985 Jul-Sep	60	1	1.7%	46^th
1985 Oct-Dec	183	8	4.4%	59^th
1986 Jan-Mar	51	1	2.0%	43^rd
1986 Apr-Jun	103	2	1.9%	54^th
1986 Jul-Sep	149	1	0.7%	30^th
1986 Oct-Oct	56	2	3.6%	65^th
1987 Jan-Mar	50	2	4.0%	64^th
1987 Apr-Jun	123	1	0.8%	16^th
1987 Jul-Sep	120	7	5.8%	69^th
1987 Oct-Dec	127	3	2.4%	33^rd
1988 Jan-Mar	84	7	8.3%	60^th
1988 Apr-Jun	137	2	1.5%	24^th
1988 Jul-Sep	127	3	2.4%	33^rd
1988 Oct-Oct	31	1	3.2%	40^th
1989 Jan-Mar	26	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Apr-Jun	77	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Jul-Sep	118	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Oct-Nov	91	2	2.2%	75^th
1990 Jan-Mar	48	0	0.0%	0^th
1990 Apr-Jun	95	1	1.1%	40^th
1990 Jul-Sep	114	2	1.8%	74^th
1990 Oct-Oct	69	0	0.0%	0^th
1991 Jan-Mar	41	0	0.0%	0^th
1991 Apr-Jun	74	0	0.0%	0^th
1991 Jul-Sep	96	2	2.1%	67^th
1991 Oct-Nov	69	0	0.0%	0^th
1992 Jan-Mar	61	2	3.3%	75^th
1992 Apr-Jun	74	2	2.7%	73^rd
1992 Jul-Sep	117	7	6.0%	80^th
1992 Oct-Oct	18	0	0.0%	0^th
1993 Feb-Mar	93	0	0.0%	0^th
1993 Apr-Jun	99	2	2.0%	55^th
1993 Jul-Sep	109	1	0.9%	44^th
1993 Oct-Nov	94	7	7.4%	92^nd
1994 Jan-Mar	86	2	2.3%	56^th
1994 Apr-Jun	92	0	0.0%	0^th
1994 Jul-Sep	136	10	7.4%	96^th
1994 Oct-Dec	15	0	0.0%	0^th
1995 Jan-Mar	125	2	1.6%	56^th
1995 Apr-Jun	171	3	1.8%	55^th
1995 Jul-Sep	184	1	0.5%	31^st
1995 Oct-Dec	133	0	0.0%	0^th
1996 Jan-Mar	60	2	3.3%	74^th
1996 Apr-Jun	122	4	3.3%	92^nd
1996 Jul-Sep	121	1	0.8%	64^th
1996 Oct-Oct	3	0	0.0%	0^th
1997 Jan-Mar	35	1	2.9%	81^st
1997 Apr-Jun	125	1	0.8%	57^th
1997 Jul-Sep	103	2	1.9%	72^nd
1997 Oct-Nov	35	4	11.4%	94^th
1998 Jan-Mar	52	2	3.8%	69^th
1998 Apr-Jun	131	2	1.5%	67^th
1998 Jul-Sep	109	4	3.7%	78^th
1998 Oct-Oct	22	0	0.0%	0^th

Primary Sources

The information on this page is originally sourced from a variety of materials, including:

unitedstates/congress-legislators, a community project gathering congressional information
The House and Senate websites, for committee membership and voting records
United States Congressional Roll Call Voting Records, 1789-1990 by Howard L. Rosenthal and Keith T. Poole.
Martis’s “The Historical Atlas of Political Parties in the United States Congress”, via Keith Poole’s roll call votes data set, for political party affiliation for Members of Congress from 1789 through about year 2000
Biographical Directory of the United States Congress for the photo
GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills

Sen. Alfonse D’Amato

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