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Rep. Joe Barton

Former Representative for Texas’s 6th District

pronounced joh // BAHR-tun

Barton was the representative for Texas’s 6th congressional district and was a Republican. He served from 1985 to 2018.

Photo of Rep. Joe Barton [R-TX6, 1985-2018]

Analysis

Legislative Metrics

Read our 2018 Report Card for Barton.

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Barton is shown as a purple triangle in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the House of Representatives in 2018 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 Barton sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 3, 2013 to Dec 21, 2018. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Barton was the primary sponsor of 9 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

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Does 9 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 110th Congress).

Bills Sponsored

Issue Areas

Barton sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Health (47%) Energy (24%) Commerce (18%) Taxation (12%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Barton recently introduced the following legislation:

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Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

Voting Record

Key Votes

Barton voted Nay

Passed 361/61 on Sep 26, 2018.

H.R. 6157 provides $674.6 billion in total discretionary budget authority for the Department of Defense for fiscal year (FY) 2019. The bill provides $606.5 billion …

Barton voted Yea

Passed 338/88 on May 13, 2015.

The USA Freedom Act (H.R. 2048, Pub.L. 114–23) is a U.S. law enacted on June 2, 2015 that restored in modified form several provisions of …

Barton voted Nay

Passed 219/206 on Dec 11, 2014.

This bill became the vehicle for passage of the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2015 [pdf], which was approved by the House on December …

Barton voted Not Voting

Barton voted Aye

Passed 304/117 on Jun 23, 2011.

The Leahy–Smith America Invents Act (AIA) is a United States federal statute that was passed by Congress and was signed into law by President Barack …

Barton voted No

Barton voted Nay

Missed Votes

From Jan 1985 to Dec 2018, Barton missed 1,191 of 20,835 roll call votes, which is 5.7%. This is much worse than the median of 2.5% among the lifetime records of representatives serving in Dec 2018. 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...

Primary Sources

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