Most U.S. senators appointed since 1990 have run to keep their seat – and most have won
The U.S. Senate has had 43 appointed members since 1990, and 27 of them (63%) have run to keep their seat.
Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World
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Congress
Congress has long struggled to pass spending bills on time
Congress has passed all its required appropriations measures on time only four times in nearly five decades.
Faith on the Hill
Christians will make up 87% of voting members in the Senate and House of Representatives, combined, in the 2025-27 congressional session.
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Publications
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Congressional productivity is up – but many new laws overturn Obama-era rules
This Congress has passed more substantive bills so far in its session than any since 2007 – though nearly a third of them were to undo Obama-era rules.
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U.S. House seats rarely flip to other party in special elections
Special elections to the U.S. House of Representatives tend to be low-turnout events, historically speaking, and seldom result in seats switching from one party to another.
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Trump’s nominees have already faced a large number of cloture votes
The president has been slow to nominate people to fill key posts, and most of those he has named have had to overcome the cloture hurdle before being confirmed.
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Many Americans haven’t heard of the House Freedom Caucus
About four-in-ten adults say they have heard “nothing at all” about the Freedom Caucus, a group of conservative Republican lawmakers in the House.
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Public Dissatisfaction With Washington Weighs on the GOP
While the party retains its advantage over the Democrats on handling terrorism, it has lost ground on immigration and foreign policy, and 68% of the public sees the Republican Party as “mostly divided.”
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What does the federal government spend your tax dollars on? Social insurance programs, mostly
From Social Security to national parks, a look at long-range trends in federal outlays relative to the U.S. economy
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Majority of states have all-Christian congressional delegations
The vast majority of the nation’s federal lawmakers (91%) describe themselves as Christians, compared with 71% of U.S. adults who say the same.
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Despite gains, women remain underrepresented among U.S. political and business leaders
One hundred years after Jeannette Rankin became the first female member of the U.S. Congress, women remain underrepresented in political and business leadership.
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Public remains divided over role of government in financial regulation
As Donald Trump and congressional Republicans take steps to roll back Obama-era financial regulations, the public remains divided over whether regulations of financial institutions have gone too far or not gone far enough.
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Q&A with Solomon Messing of Pew Research Center’s Data Labs
A conversation with the director of the Center’s Data Labs team on their new report on congressional communications and the uses and misuses of “big data.”
