Padilla Rated Second-Most Effective Democratic Senator in 118th Congress
ICYMI: SacBee: How effective are California’s senators and representatives? New survey rates them
WASHINGTON, D.C. — In case you missed it, U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) was rated as the second-most effective Democratic Senator in the 118th Congress by a nonpartisan report from the Center for Effective Lawmaking.
“My top priority in the Senate is fighting on behalf of the people of California and delivering results for our state,” said Senator Padilla. “I will continue working to deliver solutions that advance California’s leadership in combating the climate crisis and improve our resiliency to natural disasters, and I will keep standing up for working families across the state.”
The Sacramento Bee recently highlighted the report, noting that Senator Padilla sponsored 92 bills last Congress and reporting that nine passed the Senate and two became law. It also discusses three more of his bills that became law through larger legislative vehicles. The article specifically features his bipartisan Fusion Energy Act, which will accelerate the development of commercial fusion energy, as well as his bipartisan Office of Disaster Recovery and Resilience Act, which establishes a permanent Office of Disaster Recovery and Resilience within the Economic Development Administration (EDA) to support the short- and long-term economic recovery efforts of communities impacted by natural disasters.
Key Article Excerpts:
- Sen. Alex Padilla and Rep. Doris Matsui ranked among the most effective members of the last Congress, a new survey found Tuesday.
- The study rated Padilla the Senate’s second most effective Democrat last year.
- Padilla sponsored 92 bills in the last Congress. The Senate passed nine and two eventually became law. Three of his bills were mostly included in other measures that became law. Among them was the Office of Disaster Recovery and Resilience Act, which creates an office to provide economic recovery help to areas ravaged by disasters.
- Also becoming law was the Fusion Energy Act of 2024, which wound up in budget legislation. The act is designed to allow the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to have regulatory authority over commercial fusion energy systems for certain purposes.
- “The fact that both of these sponsored bills were referred to committees where he sat presumably provided him with opportunities to ensure that these measures were incorporated into other bills that were likely to advance further in the legislative process,” the report said.
Full text of the article is available here.