Senate Report Card: Ron Wyden D-OR

Senator Ron Wyden is the senior Democratic United States Senator from the state of Oregon. Senator Wyden assumed office in 1996.

Senator Wyden serves on the Energy and Natural Resources, Finance, Budget, Aging and Intelligence Committees. He is the chairman of the Subcommittee on Forests and Public Land.

Senator Wyden is a mix of social liberalism and fiscally moderate attitudes. He is generally pro trade. He voted against the USA Patriot Act. He voted yes on an amendment that stated that enemy combatants were not entitled to the rights of Habeas Corpus. Wyden supports free trade and voted in favor of CAFTA. He was also one of the few Democrats to vote in favor of the Bush-Administration proposed prescription drug plan, which ultimately failed. He broke ranks with his party in favor of phasing out many farm subsidy programs and also to implement welfare reform policies. Wyden voted against the Class Action Fairness Act and the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act, which makes it more difficult to obtain a bankruptcy.

Wyden introduced wildfire legislation that protects communities while at the same time maintaining strong environmental protections. The Community and Forest Protection Act, provides workable wildfire-fighting and prevention strategies while protecting the environment and public involvement. The bill recognizes the need to fund the protection of public and private forest lands. It preserves the ability of citizens to appeal agency decisions, but eliminates up to several years of delay that currently can effectively render an agency decision moot, requires courts to regularly re-examine the merits of temporary injunctions without attempting to influence the outcome of decisions on injunctive relief, protects environmentally sensitive areas while giving greater discretion to federal forestry employees and the states about where best to focus fire reduction efforts and authorizes grants to states and localities to address emergency threats to public safety in places like the San Bernardino, Cleveland, Deschutes and Siskiyou National Forests.

Ron Wyden proposed changes to President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act that included improving school assessment more fair through composite scoring, recognizing the unique challenges facing rural schools, creating a national teacher workforce strategy, involve parents in the process and providing improved instruction for special populations. He also proposed a major initiative to triple the number of American women and earning degrees and working in the areas of math and the hard sciences that would bring more women into technological, high intensity math and science careers.

Senator Ron Wyden voted against the Iraq War Resolution. He favors a phased withdrawal and redeployment of U.S. forces from Iraq.

Senator Ron Wyden faces reelection in Oregon in 2008.