The Capitol Audit: We Graded the Committee Chairs. It Got a 64.

Missed 2.2% of roll-call votes across a 23-year career, on par with the House's 2.1% median. He was the primary sponsor of 21 bills that became law, the majority of them the appropriations packages his gavel exists to move, including the FY2026 Homeland Security, Commerce-Justice-Science, and Financial Services funding acts. His donor profile runs toward defense contractors and tribal-gaming interests — he is widely regarded as the House's leading voice on Native American and tribal-government policy — a pattern that tracks his committee seat and long-standing advocacy, not a hidden conflict. No current ethics or criminal findings; a 2005 recusal from a colleague's unrelated ethics matter is two decades old and not a mark against him.

Missed 2.1% of votes since 2007, exactly the House median — attendance is not the issue. The record worth printing is legislative output: across eighteen years and 825 bills sponsored or co-sponsored, not one bill for which Jordan was the primary sponsor has ever been signed into law, a fact that predates and continues through his chairmanship of one of the House's most powerful committees. His top donor industry is communications and electronics (over $760,000 career), with Koch Industries among his largest individual-employer donors. The House select committee investigating January 6 referred him to the House Ethics Committee for defying a subpoena; no discipline followed. Decades-old allegations that he ignored player abuse as an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State remain unproven and are not part of this office's scored record, but are part of the public one.

The best attendance record among the House chairs — 1.0% of votes missed since 2005 — and 11 personally sponsored bills signed into law, including the bipartisan Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act. Set against that: her top donor industry, dating back through her years chairing the House education committee, is for-profit higher education, an industry she has repeatedly worked to shield from federal "gainful employment" oversight rules. That is as direct a donor-to-policy line as exists on this card, even though nothing about it is illegal.

Missed 1.6% of votes since 2013, better than the House median, and has sponsored 123 bills over his career — the exact count enacted as primary sponsor could not be independently confirmed and we note that gap rather than guess. He was the youngest Ways and Means chairman since before the Civil War and was a lead drafter of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. His donor base is diversified rather than concentrated in one industry — securities and investment, lobbyists, retirees, insurance, and real estate all sit in a similar range — which is itself notable for a chairman overseeing tax policy. No criminal or ethics findings against him.

Missed 2.3% of votes since 2003, worse than the House median, and has introduced the fewest bills of any member of the Alabama delegation in recent years — a specific count of his enacted bills as primary sponsor could not be independently confirmed. The number that matters most: OpenSecrets ranked Rogers the single largest House recipient of defense-sector campaign money nationally in the most recent full cycle, over $440,000, and the top House recipient of Lockheed Martin contributions specifically, while he chairs the committee that authorizes the defense budget. That is the most concentrated donor-to-committee overlap on this entire card. No criminal or ethics findings against him personally.

A perfect attendance record — zero roll-call votes missed since 1997, the best on this entire card — and 54 personally sponsored bills signed into law, a strong output for a chamber where most legislation moves as committee product rather than individual bills. Her donor base runs toward healthcare, finance, and defense, sectors with direct stakes in the Appropriations Committee she chairs, though no single industry dominates. In 2020, three executives of a Hawaii defense contractor were indicted for funneling illegal contributions to a PAC supporting her reelection; her campaign was not accused of wrongdoing, and we report the donors' indictment as exactly that — theirs, not hers.

The strongest record on this card. Missed 0.5% of votes across more than five decades in Congress, and was the primary sponsor of 109 bills signed into law — the highest enacted count of anyone graded here, House or Senate. His top donor industries run through agribusiness and food processing, tracking his role representing Iowa's farm economy rather than any outside financial interest. No criminal or ethics findings against him.

Missed 1.9% of votes since his Senate election, better than the chamber's 2.8% career median, and was the primary sponsor of 40 bills signed into law. His donor profile is broad rather than concentrated — he is a top recipient nationally from farm bureaus, forest products, poultry, and telephone utilities, all core Mississippi industries, with defense contractors appearing but not dominating. That spread, on a chairman of Armed Services, contrasts directly with the concentration on Rogers's card. No criminal or ethics findings against him.

Missed 2.1% of votes since 1993, better than the Senate's 2.8% career median, and was the primary sponsor of 24 bills signed into law, including the Secure Rural Schools Reauthorization Act of 2025. His top donor industry is securities and investment, over $700,000 in the most recent full cycle, with commercial banks and credit companies also well represented — a direct overlap with the Finance Committee's jurisdiction over tax, trade, and financial regulation, echoing the same pattern flagged on Schumer's card in the leadership audit. No criminal or ethics findings against him.