Freshman Democrat Rep. Katie Porter (D-Irvine), who may be the first member of Congress to wear a Halloween costume in the House, tends to stick out amongst her colleagues in the Capitol. Given her presence it is easy to notice when she is not around – which is becoming a trend for the first-term Congresswoman.
Porter is nearly half-way through her first term and her attendance record is starting to raise some eye brows not just around Capitol Hill, but back home in Orange County.
To date, Porter is in the 90th percentile amongst her congressional colleagues when it comes to missing votes, but it is the subject matter of the particular votes that Porter chose to skip and her reasons for doing so that are drawing criticism.
A partial list of Porter’s missed votes and the important subject matter include:
Res 703: Workplace Violence Prevention
Res 106: Denounces forced female mutilation/cutting
Res 326: Resolving Iraeli-Palestinian conflict
HR 1952: Cyber security for the State Department
Res 758: Lower Drug Costs
HR 502: Stopping sex trafficking
While Congressional correspondence shows that most of the time Porter did not bother providing a reason for her absence, reporters on the Presidential campaign trail helped pinpoint Porter’s whereabouts:
Rep Katie Porter will be in the debate spin room for Elizabeth Warren tonight. Porter, who was elected in ’18, is her former law student & named one of her children after Warren.
— Liz Goodwin (@lizcgoodwin) November 20, 2019
The truancy does not end with playing hooky from official votes to stump for her socialist mentor Elizabeth Warren. Back in September of this year, the House Committee on Financial Services met to discuss Porter’s legislation focused on student loan debt. The hearing, was titled: “A $1.5 Trillion Crisis: Protecting Student Borrowers and Holding Student Loan Servicers Accountable” and was primarily focused on Porter’s student loan legislation.
However, despite being in the capitol that day, Rep. Katie Porter decided to skip this landmark hearing to pose for a photo that she had been organizing with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (or “AOC”) for months:
Back to school means it’s time for a new class photo! 📸🇺🇸#OurUnityIsOurPower pic.twitter.com/sJpAHFe760
— Rep. Katie Porter (@RepKatiePorter) September 10, 2019
Similar to not providing a reason for the missed votes, Porter’s office did not return request for comment for skipping the hearing to pose for a photo with another member of the socialist wing of the Democratic Party.
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