![Photo of Sen. Sherrod Brown [D-OH]](/static/legislator-photos/400050-200px.jpeg)
Analysis
Legislative Metrics
Read our 2019 Report Card for Brown.
Ideology–Leadership Chart
Brown is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot is a member of the Senate positioned according to our liberal–conservative ideology score (left to right) and our leadership score (leaders are toward the top).
The chart is based on the bills Brown has sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 6, 2015 to Feb 13, 2020. See full analysis methodology.
Ratings from Advocacy Organizations
Committee Membership
Sherrod Brown sits on the following committees:
- Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Ranking Member
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Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry
- Commodities, Risk Management, and Trade subcommittee Ranking Member
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Senate Committee on Finance
- Social Security, Pensions, and Family Policy subcommittee Ranking Member
- Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs
Enacted Legislation
Brown was the primary sponsor of 20 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:
- S. 3049: Laboratory Access for Beneficiaries Act
- S. 1436: A bill to make technical corrections to the computation of average pay under Public Law 110-279.
- S. 2377: A bill to designate the Federal building and United States courthouse located at 200 West 2nd Street in Dayton, Ohio, as the “Walter H. Rice Federal Building and ...
- S. 1319: Community Care Core Competency Act of 2017
- S. 1236: A bill to require the Attorney General to designate Human Trafficking Coordinators for Federal judicial districts, and for other purposes.
- S. 857: African American Civil Rights Network Act
- S. 802: Larry Doby Congressional Gold Medal Act
Does 20 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
Brown sponsors bills primarily in these issue areas:
Health (37%) Taxation (23%) Armed Forces and National Security (11%) Labor and Employment (9%) Education (5%) Public Lands and Natural Resources (5%) Finance and Financial Sector (5%) Social Welfare (5%)
Recent Bills
Some of Brown’s most recently sponsored bills include...
- S. 3174: Reversing the Youth Tobacco Epidemic Act of 2020
- S. 3049: Laboratory Access for Beneficiaries Act
- S. 3027: Child Abuse Death Disclosure Act
- S. 2938: Fair Warning Act of 2019
- S. 2952: National Heritage Areas Reauthorization Act of 2019
- S.Res. 436: A resolution supporting the goals, activities, and ideals of Prematurity Awareness Month.
- S.Res. 420: A resolution encouraging the President to expand the list of the Department of ...
Voting Record
Key Votes
Missed Votes
From Jan 2007 to Feb 2020, Brown missed 50 of 4,077 roll call votes, which is 1.2%. This is on par with the median of 1.5% among the lifetime records of senators currently serving. 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.
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
