Rep. Mac Thornberry
Former Representative for Texas’s 13th District
pronounced mak // THAWRN-beh-ree
Thornberry was the representative for Texas’s 13th congressional district and was a Republican. He served from 1995 to 2020.
![Photo of Rep. Mac Thornberry [R-TX13, 1995-2020]](/static/legislator-photos/400404-200px.jpeg)
Analysis
Legislative Metrics
Read our 2020 Report Card for Thornberry.
Ideology–Leadership Chart
Thornberry is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the House of Representatives in 2020 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 Thornberry sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 6, 2015 to Dec 28, 2020. See full analysis methodology.
Enacted Legislation
Thornberry was the primary sponsor of 13 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:
- H.R. 346 (116th): Red River Gradient Boundary Survey Act
- H.R. 5772 (115th): To designate the J. Marvin Jones Federal Building and Courthouse in Amarillo, Texas, as the “J. Marvin Jones Federal Building and Mary Lou Robinson United States Courthouse”.
- H.R. 5515 (115th): John S. McCain National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019
- H.R. 6047 (115th): SALTS Act
- H.R. 2810 (115th): National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018
- H.R. 2807 (115th): To amend title 10, United States Code, to require congressional notification concerning sensitive military cyber operations and cyber weapons, and for other purposes.
- H.R. 393 (115th): To provide for an exception to a limitation against appointment of persons as Secretary of Defense within seven years of relief from active duty as a regular …
Does 13 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
Thornberry sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:
Armed Forces and National Security (61%) Public Lands and Natural Resources (17%) Environmental Protection (11%) Taxation (11%)
Recently Introduced Bills
Thornberry recently introduced the following legislation:
- H.R. 8365 (116th): Accurate Weather for Public Safety Act
- H.R. 6613 (116th): Indo-Pacific Deterrence Initiative
- H.R. 6489 (116th): To improve military family readiness.
- H.R. 3014 (116th): Accelerating Defense Innovation Act of 2019
- H.R. 2287 (116th): Federal Regulatory Certainty for Water Act
- H.R. 346 (116th): Red River Gradient Boundary Survey Act
- H.R. 222 (116th): Death Tax Repeal Act of 2019
View All » | View Cosponsors »
Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.
Voting Record
Key Votes
Missed Votes
From Jan 1995 to Dec 2020, Thornberry missed 206 of 17,002 roll call votes, which is 1.2%. This is better than the median of 2.3% among the lifetime records of representatives serving in Dec 2020. 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.
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
- GPO Member Guide for the photo
- GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills
