Rep. Fortney “Pete” Stark

Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Stark is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the House of Representatives in 2013 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 Stark sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 4, 2007 to Jan 1, 2013. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Stark was the primary sponsor of 15 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

• H.R. 7198 (110th): Stephanie Tubbs Jones Gift of Life Medal Act of 2008
• H.R. 6950 (110th): Stephanie Tubbs Jones Gift of Life Medal Act of 2008
• H.R. 6252 (110th): Medicare DMEPOS Competitive Acquisition Reform Act of 2008
• H.R. 5252 (103rd): Social Security Act Amendments of 1994
• H.R. 2902 (103rd): Federal Payment Reauthorization Act of 1994
• H.R. 4039 (100th): A bill to disclaim any right, title, or interest of the United States in certain lands in the State of California which form a part of the …
• H.R. 2470 (100th): Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act of 1988

View All »

Does 15 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

Stark sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Health (30%) Taxation (23%) Families (16%) Social Welfare (9%) Government Operations and Politics (7%) Immigration (7%) Economics and Public Finance (5%) Labor and Employment (5%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Stark recently introduced the following legislation:

• H.R. 6549 (112th): Computers in Our Communities Act
• H.R. 6435 (112th): Medicare Secondary Payer and Late Enrollment Penalty Family Fairness Act of 2012
• H.R. 4379 (112th): Women’s Option to Raise Kids Act
• H.R. 4254 (112th): Medicare Advantage Program Integrity Act of 2012
• H.R. 3881 (112th): Ensuring Mental Competence in Immigration Proceedings Act
• H.R. 3840 (112th): Narrowing Exceptions for Withholding Taxes Act of 2012
• H.R. 3333 (112th): Foster Children Opportunity Act

View All » | View Cosponsors »

Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

Voting Record

Key Votes

Missed Votes

From Jan 1973 to Jan 2013, Stark missed 2,782 of 23,975 roll call votes, which is 11.6%. This is much worse than the median of 2.6% among the lifetime records of representatives serving in Jan 2013. The chart below reports missed votes over time.

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

Show the numbers...

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
• Congressional Pictorial Directory for the photo
• GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills