Compilation of Frank LoBiondo Votes 2013-2016
By Kimball Baker, Volunteer Atlantic County Democratic Headquarters
Source: Atlantic City Press: How Your Lawmakers Voted
Information provided by Nick Reina
This is a list of Frank LoBiondo votes in Congress over the past four years under 12 issue headings: Health Care, Economic and Worker Justice, Wall Street Reform, Consumer Protection, Environmental Protection, Women’s Rights, Immigration Reform, Opposing Discrimination, Helping Seniors, Veterans and the Active-Duty Military, Controlling Guns, Improving Education and Children’s Services, Foreign Affairs, and Budget/Rule-Making Processes.
HEALTH CARE
* For cutting health-care benefits.
* For privatizing Medicare and converting it into a voucher system.
* For raising the cost of drugs under Medicare Part D.
* For repealing or hampering the Affordable Health Care Act (AHCA);
No substitute measures have been offered.
*Against an AHCA panel to control Medicare costs.
*Against upholding a preexisting-conditions waiver for health care.
*For delaying or eliminating the individual-mandate portion of AHCA.
*Against broadening the AHCA.
*For restricting AHCA coverage by redefining “full time” from 30
hours a week to 40 hours a week.
*For suing the President for extending the period during which
employers could provide AHCA coverage for workers.
*For use of Health Savings Accounts for over-the-counter medicines,
thus helping to replace the AHCA.
ECONOMIC AND WORKER JUSTICE
Job Creation
*Against a $40 billion, six-year rail/transit infrastructure project
funded by the crackdown on companies relocating their headquarters
to other countries.
Worker Justice
*Against a minimum-wage increase.
*For exempting defense contractors from minimum-wage provisions.
*Against replacing National Labor Relations Board vacancies.
*Against extending jobless-benefits eligibility to the long-term
unemployed.
*Against flexibility on overtime-wage rules.
*For freezing the pay of Federal workers.
*Against considering wage/salary disparities as part of the Treasury
Secretary’s report to Congress on the national debt.
*For easing of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) rules on
issuing company stocks to workers in lieu of higher pay.
Political Justice
*Against lifting unreasonable limits on voting.
*Against publicly identifying political donors who contribute secretly.
*Against the SEC requiring corporations to disclose political
contributions to political social-welfare groups.
Taxation
*For lowering taxes on the rich.
*For repealing the Federal estate tax.
*For permanently extending corporate tax breaks created to deal with
recession.
*Against denying benefits to businesses reincorporating overseas to
avoid U.S. taxation.
*Against making productivity pay-raises for workers a condition of tax
deductions from billion-dollar CEOs’ salaries.
*For reducing Internal Revenue Service funds for catching tax cheats.
WALL STREET REFORM
*For weakening Dodd-Frank financial regulations.
*For exempting major banks from a Dodd-Frank requirement that
financial institutions not include risky derivatives trading in their
taxpayer-insured units.
*For delaying protection of retail investors who consult financial
advisors.
*For curbing financial oversight by the Commodity Futures Trading
Commission.
*Against stronger SEC securities-regulation and investor-protection.
*For weakening Federal Reserve rules regarding banks’ debt-to-equity
ratios, even when minorities, low-income people, and rural populations
are underserved.
*For subjecting independent financial-regulatory units within the
Treasury Department to Congressional appropriations and not to
assessments levied on banks and other financial institutions.
CONSUMER PROTECTION
*For weakening the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).
*For undercutting of individual rights to sue mortgage banks which
violate CFPB regulations.
*Against CFPB rules for mandatory-arbitration clauses in credit-card
contracts.
*Against Federal Communications Commission regulation of Internet-
service rates; such opposition interferes with net neutrality.
*For stripping the Federal Trade Commission of its in-house authority
to judge whether proposed mergers/acquisitions violate anti-trust
laws; such stripping would result in higher prescription-drug costs.
*Against stronger inspections of imported meat.
*For allowing banks to engage in risky derivatives trading which results
in higher gas prices.
*For removing inflation as a factor in the budget-making process; such
removal would reduce the safety of food and aviation.
*For taking $7 billion away from AMTRAK’s efforts to make long-
distance rail service better and safer.
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
Renewable Energy
*Against Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) program for
development of renewable-energy technologies.
*For energy budget that halves renewable-energy spending.
Research
*For more corporate representation, and less academic representation,
On EPA’s Scientific Advisory Board, even if corporate candidates
have a financial interest in Board decisions or have committed major
environmental violations.
*For overemphasizing fossil-fuel research and downplaying or cutting
clean-energy researches, programs, and technologies.
Clean Water
*Against EPA regulations which would protect the waters upstream
from navigable waters.
*Against requiring companies to disclose chemicals endangering public-
water supplies.
*Against stronger protection of water supplies from copper mines.
Pipelines
*For the Keystone XL Pipeline, waiving environmental laws/rules as
necessary.
*Against requiring the Keystone XL Pipeline to pay into the Treasury
Department’s Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund.
*For weakening reviews of pipeline projects crossing Canada/Mexico
borders.
Fracking and Natural Gas
*For speeding up the permitting process for fracking and natural-gas
pipelines, despite any adverse effects such speeding-up would have on
safety or any environmental harm caused.
*Against public disclosure of fracking operations.
*Against making sure that fracking is safe and that communities
involved have maximum input.
*Against banning fracking on Federal/Indian lands.
*For speeding up exports by natural-gas companies, even to countries
sponsoring terrorism and/or cyber attacks.
Toxic Wastes/Emissions
*Against studying the adverse health effects of mountaintop-removal
coal-mining and thus expediting regulation of it.
*Against strengthening rules concerning disposal of toxic coal wastes.
*For scaling back Superfund regulations for companies disposing of
toxic wastes.
*Against EPA limiting carbon emissions for coal/gas-fired power plants.
*Against EPA curbing emissions from the making of brick/clay/ceramic
products.
Oil Drilling/Spilling
*For oil drilling (except off the New Jersey coast).
*Against compensation for California oil-spill victims.
*For exempting Gulf of Mexico oil drillers from Dodd-Frank
transparency.
Climate Change
*Against EPA researching technologies to combat climate change.
*Against Federal agencies considering climate change in rules
pertaining to energy projects or oil/gas drilling.
*For requiring the National Science Foundation to justify climate-
change research as “demonstrably” in the public interest.
*For barring U.S. presidents from addressing climate change in future
trade negotiations.
Environmental Rule-Making
*For weakening of environmental-stewardship guidelines.
*For curbing National Environmental Policy Act regulation of Federally-
connected construction, scaling back rules and speeding up reviews.
*For speeding up reforestation and commercial logging in fire-ravaged
national forests.
*For speeding up Federal mining in the West, waiving environmental
laws and limiting lawsuits.
WOMEN’S RIGHTS
Equal Pay for Equal Work
*For impeding regulations which expedite benefits for women and
require equal pay for equal work.
*For exempting defense contractors from pay-equity provisions for
women.
*Against ensuring that Federal pay-equity lawsuits are not judged to
be “frivolous”.
Health Care
*Against ensuring that health-care coverage doesn’t raise women’s
premiums or deny them pregnancy care.
*For redefining “full time” in the AHCA as 40 hours a week instead of
30, thus significantly reducing the Act’s coverage of women.
Abortion
*For outlawing abortion rights after 20 weeks and thus threatening
Roe v. Wade.
*For employers and medical personnel to have a legal claim to
conscience-based objections to abortion.
*For barring the use of AHCA funds for abortions, despite the Act’s
provision that women pay for them on their own.
Planned Parenthood
*For defunding Planned Parenthood.
*For slashing funding for Planned Parenthood, with an exemption for
preventive care, e.g. screening for cervical/breast cancer.
*For denying Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood, despite such
denial’s lessening of women’s access to medical services.
*Against Zika-related reproductive-care assistance to Planned
Parenthood at a time when the House of Representatives refused
sufficient funding to attack Zika.
IMMIGRATION REFORM
*Against shielding from deportation five million undocumented
immigrants whose children are U.S. citizens or legal residents born
before November 20, 2014.
*For the House of Representatives filing a Supreme Court brief
against the Executive Order shielding these immigrants.
*Against temporarily housing undocumented children at military bases.
*For blocking the Dream Act.
OPPOSING DISCRIMINATION
*For removing AHCA provisions to forbid gender bias.
*For raising the costs of Medicare Part D drugs without provision for
possible gender bias.
*Against ensuring that Federal anti-discrimination lawsuits are not
judged to be “frivolous”.
*Against upholding an Executive Order banning companies receiving
Federal contracts from discriminating against employees who are
lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender.
*Against enforcement of Administration policies on gender-based
bathroom access.
HELPING SENIORS
*For delaying protection of seniors who consult financial advisors
concerning their pensions and retirement accounts.
*For removing inflation as a factor in budget deliberations and thus
reducing aid to nursing homes.
*For raising energy costs for seniors on fixed incomes by speeding up
natural-gas exports.
*For raising the costs of Medicare Part D drugs, and thus the tax
burden as well.
*For undercutting the rights of home-buying seniors to sue mortgage
lenders who violate CFPB regulations.
*Against denying Federal Reserve emergency lending to financial
institutions which have swindled seniors and their retirement funds.
*For defeating a Department of Labor rule that retirement/pension
advisors are obligated to put clients’ financial interests over theirs.
VETERANS AND THE ACTIVE-DUTY MILITARY
*For impeding regulations expediting veterans’ benefits.
*Against hiring staff to clear the backlog of veterans’ claims.
*For delaying protection of veterans who consult financial advisors
concerning their pensions and retirement accounts.
*For weakening protections against unscrupulous payday-lending
practices at or near military posts.
*For curbing Federal policing of bank fraud, thus serving the interests
of payday lenders.
*For endangering veterans’ benefits by calling for the elimination of
inflation as a factor in budget deliberations.
CONTROLLING GUNS
*Against more criminal-background checks on commercial gun sales.
*Against considering legislation to ban guns/explosives to people on the
FBI Terror Watch List.
*For curbing Federal policing of bank fraud, thus serving the interests
of gun sellers.
*Against a National Science Foundation research priority on gun
violence, which has adverse effects akin to smoking-related deaths
and highway mortality.
*For blocking enforcement of D.C. gun laws, which ban assault weapons
and large-capacity magazines and which require handgun registration.
IMPROVING EDUCATION AND CHILDREN’S SERVICES
*Against higher standards for education programs.
*Against using inflation in the budget process, a position leading to
reduction of educational benefits.
*For weakening Federal support of public-school education.
*For variable interest rates on student loans.
*Against the refinancing of student loans.
*Against a requirement that banks which make student loans must
disclose the amounts and types of brokerage fees, as well as the
cumulative costs over 10-20 years
*Against states and localities committing to adequate funding for
education of people with disabilities.
*Against requiring schools in private/charter voucher programs to obey
provisions of the Civil Rights Act, the Educational Opportunities Act,
and the Americans with Disabilities Act.
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
*Against closing Guantanamo despite valid cost and justice concerns.
*For continuing the House of Representatives investigation of Benghazi
despite Republican admittance of its being used to try to lower Hilary
Clinton’s poll numbers.
*Against updating the U.S. Government’s war-authority stance.
*Against the U.S.-Iran treaty which dismantles Iran’s nuclear-arms
program over a 15-year period and provides sanctions relief.
*Against lifting the ban on travel to Cuba.
BUDGET/RULE-MAKING PROCESSES
*For overturning legal doctrines which require judges to defer to
Executive Branch interpretation of statutes.
*Against clean-budget bill.
*For partial-funding bills which involve no new revenues.
*For making Congressional Budget Office forecasts using supply-side
economics.
*For removing inflation as a factor to determine the baseline figure
for budget deliberations.
*For shielding conventional spending in an emergency military-spending
account.
*Against agencies issuing new regs without repealing existing ones.