Rep. Ralph Abraham
Former Representative for Louisiana’s 5th District
pronounced ralf // AYB-ruh-ham
Abraham was the representative for Louisiana’s 5th congressional district and was a Republican. He served from 2015 to 2020.
![Photo of Rep. Ralph Abraham [R-LA5, 2015-2020]](/static/legislator-photos/412630-200px.jpeg)
Our work to hold Congress accountable only matters if elections are decided by counting votes. President Trump, his senior government advisors, and Republican legislators collaborated to have the 2020 presidential election decided by themselves rather than by voters. Their attempts to suppress entire state-certified vote counts without adjudication in the courts and using a disinformation campaign of lies and conspiracy theories was a months-long, multifarious attempted coup.
Abraham was among the Republican legislators who participated in the attempted coup. Shortly after the election, Abraham joined a case before the Supreme Court calling for all the votes for president in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — states that were narrowly won by Democrats — to be discarded, in order to change the outcome of the election, based on lies and a preposterous legal argument which the Supreme Court rejected. (Following the rejection of several related cases before the Supreme Court, another legislator who joined the case called for violence.) The January 6, 2021 violent insurrection at the Capitol, led on the front lines by militant white supremacy groups, attempted to prevent President-elect Joe Biden from taking office by disrupting Congress’s count of electors. President Trump was indicted in 2023 for soliciting the Vice President to subvert Congress’s certification of the election and his role in the fraudulent slates of electors and the insurrection at the Capitol.
Analysis
Legislative Metrics
Read our 2020 Report Card for Abraham.
Ideology–Leadership Chart
Abraham 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 Abraham sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 6, 2015 to Dec 28, 2020. See full analysis methodology.
Enacted Legislation
Abraham was the primary sponsor of 2 bills that were enacted:
- H.R. 2941 (115th): Kisatchie National Forest Land Conveyance Act
- H.R. 5588 (114th): Veterans’ Compensation COLA Act of 2016
Does 2 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
Abraham sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:
Armed Forces and National Security (21%) Agriculture and Food (16%) Taxation (11%) Science, Technology, Communications (11%) Health (11%) Animals (11%) Public Lands and Natural Resources (11%) Social Welfare (11%)
Recently Introduced Bills
Abraham recently introduced the following legislation:
- H.R. 6921 (116th): Healthy Dog Importation Act
- H.Res. 620 (116th): In the Matter of Nancy Pelosi.
- H.Res. 522 (116th): Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the production of …
- H.R. 1495 (116th): Income Verification Act
- H.R. 1238 (116th): To direct the Secretary of Agriculture to treat certain planted soybean crops …
- H.R. 837 (116th): Chronic Wasting Disease Transmission in Cervidae Study Act
- H.R. 7147 (115th): To direct the Secretary of Agriculture to treat certain planted soybean crops …
View All » | View Cosponsors »
Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.
Voting Record
Key Votes
Missed Votes
From Jan 2015 to Dec 2020, Abraham missed 397 of 3,489 roll call votes, which is 11.4%. This is much worse 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
