Senators Cindy Hyde-Smith and Roger Wicker have both been recognized by the American Conservative Union for their work in the United States Senate.
The American Conservative Union Foundation (ACUF) has just released the 48th Edition of its annual Ratings of Congress. The guide ranks members of Congress based upon their commitment to conservative principles as demonstrated by their voting records in the 2018 session of Congress. These Ratings of Congress—and the Ratings of all 50 state legislatures—are initiatives of ACU Foundation’s Center for Legislative Accountability.
Every year ACU rates about 8,000 elected officials across 101 legislative chambers across the country.
Senators Hyde-Smith and Wicker both received the Award for Conservative Achievement, which was given to Republican U.S. Senators who voted 80%-89% in line with the values of the ACU.
The ACU gave Senators Hyde-Smith and Wicker conservative rankings of 82.35% and 84.4%, respectively.
For Senator Hyde-Smith, her score comes from her vote falling in line with that of the ACU on matters such as repealing an Obama-Era rule that harms indirect auto lending; re-imposing “Net Neutrality” regulations on the internet; providing Congressional oversight of the Committee on Foreign Investment; and more.
For Senator Wicker, his score comes from his vote aligning with the stance of the ACU on several key issues such as confirming Sam Brownback as Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom; banning abortions of pain-capable unborn children; defunding “sanctuary cities” and more.
However, both Senators Hyde-Smith and Wicker voted against the ACU’s stance on reducing cronyism in agricultural “checkoff” programs; extending the National Flood Insurance Program and preventing overregulation by the FDA in the “milk” industry, which negatively impacted their scores.
2018 ACU Foundation Report by yallpolitics on Scribd
This year, ACU Foundation double-weighted the vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court and another to re-impose government control of the internet. The percentage of Republicans earning awards for their conservative voting records fell compared to the 2017 session (from 66 percent to 55 percent). The average scores of Democrats were 10 percent in the Senate and 8 percent in the House.
This session’s scorecard is made up of 25 bills in the U.S. House of Representatives and 20 bills in the U.S. Senate. The bills selected cover a wide range of issues including fiscal and economic, social and cultural, and national security, and are designed to reflect how lawmakers view the role of government in an individual’s life.
The ACU said that these ratings were just proof of a continuation of conservative work being done in the current administration.
“The Trump administration continued its push for conservative policies and nominees in 2018,” said ACU Chairman Matt Schlapp. “In response, the Senate took action to confirm a number of judges and achieved a landmark political victory to confirm Brett Kavanaugh, but Congress (and especially the House which operates under a simple “majority rules” system) mostly squandered a historic opportunity to implement meaningful conservative policy solutions, including funding a wall on our southern border, repealing and replacing Obamacare, and passing signature work requirements in conjunction with nutrition or welfare benefits. One bright spot was when conservatives of both chambers led the fight to pass the First Step Act. We struggled to find bills to score because of Congress’ big whiff, but in the end, we were able to find a sufficient number of votes to reflect a members’ adherence to conservative principles.”
Courtney Ingle
