Please help us! Donate
Vote Smart Just The Facts
"Experts nearly all recommend Vote Smart."
"Vote Smart is a bright light in an often desultory civic culture."
- Bill Moyers
"We think so highly of Vote Smart that we are distributing their materials to all of our affiliates."
Paul Ryan's Voting Records
Issue
- down
- Abortion
- Abortion and Reproductive
- Agriculture and Food
- Animals and Wildlife
- Arts, Entertainment, and History
- Business and Consumers
- Campaign Finance and Elections
- Civil Liberties and Civil Rights
- Constitution
- Crime
- Death Penalty
- Defense
- Drugs
- Economy and Fiscal
- Education
- Employment and Affirmative Action
- Energy
- Entitlements and the Safety Net
- Environment
- Executive Branch
- Federal, State and Local Relations
- Finance and Banking
- Food Processing and Sales
- Foreign Affairs
- Foreign Aid
- Gambling and Gaming
- Government Budget and Spending
- Government Operations
- Guns
- Health and Health Care
- Health Insurance
- Higher Education
- Housing and Property
- Immigration
- Indigenous Peoples
- Infrastructure
- Judicial Branch
- K-12 Education
- Labor Unions
- Legal
- Legislative Branch
- Marijuana Legalization
- Marriage
- Marriage, Family, and Children
- Military Personnel
- Minors and Children
- Monetary Policy
- National Security
- Natural Resources and Energy
- Oil and Gas
- Religion
- Science
- Senior Citizens
- Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity
- Stem Cell Research
- Taxes
- Technology and Communication
- Trade
- Transportation
- Unemployed and Low-Income
- Veterans
- Women
National Key Votes
About the Selection and Description of Key Votes
Vote Smart provides easy access to Congressional and state voting records and maintains a collection of key votes grouped by issue. Vote Smart uses the following criteria to select key votes:
- The vote should be helpful in portraying how a member stands on a particular issue
- The vote should be clear for any person to understand
- The vote has received media attention
- The vote was passed or defeated by a very close margin
- Occasionally, if a specific bill is consistently inquired about on the Voter's Research Hotline, the vote will be added
Vote Smart provides a summary of the version of the bill text associated with each selected key vote. The summary does not necessarily reflect the content of the final version of the bill. Summaries are written by Vote Smart's staff and interns, who adhere to the project's strict policies and procedures in order to guarantee absolute impartiality and accuracy. Each key vote selection is reviewed by the project's community of advisors, who are political scientists and journalists from all fifty states.
