Welcome to what is the 911th original profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day”, where we’ll be discussing the current U.S. House Representative from New York’s 21st Congressional District, Elise Stefanik, who first won office for that seat back in the 2014 elections, when she was only 30 years old, setting a record at the time for being the youngest woman ever elected to Congress (since broken by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez). Her district only slightly leaned Republican when she got elected, so for her first two terms in office, her voting record reflected that, as she was one of the more moderate members of the House GOP… but admittedly, that’s a low bar to clear these days.
Everything started to change as she did the political calculus as her district has veered right. And as the investigations into Donald Trump accepting foreign assistance in the 2016 election started closing in on them, as Rep. Stefanik was one of many members of the House Intelligence Committee who was following the lead of Congressman Devin Nunes, claiming there was “no evidence” of any crime (oh, there is).
By the time Trump had AGAIN solicited foreign assistance, this time for the 2020 election from Ukraine, Elise Stefanik saw an opportunity to take the spotlight during the impeachment hearings, pretending she was being “silenced” because Adam Schiff enforced hearing rules and didn’t allow Devin Nunes to cede the remainder of his time to her, and virtually overnight reinventing herself as a “ride or die” Trump supporter. Her role in the hearings was essential as Republican members of the committee like Jim Jordan and Devin Nunes went after witnesses like Fiona Hill and Marie Yovanovitch painting an ultimately sexist angle to the proceedings (and the GOP were already losing the support of suburban women), so the Republicans needed the optics of having Stefanik do all their heavy lifting to avoid the sort of spectacle that they set up during say, the testimony of Christine Blasey Ford less than a year earlier. And Stefanik made the most of her time during the day to act like Trump was the victim, before running on Fox News afterwards to try to rack up bonus points.
One of the low lights was when she went as far as to claim Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff was “unfit” to be the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, before using all of the bad press she got from the mainstream media for the partisan sniping she made in Trump’s name during the impeachment hearings as an excuse to fundraise for 2020 and blow any potential GOP Primary challengers out of the water with ads. And when we say she went “ride or die” with Trump, we meant it, as she was even given a chance to speak at the 2020 RNC where she continued insisting Trump never committed a crime when he withheld aid from Ukraine unless they announced an investigation into Hunter Biden, and framing the entire impeachment as “an attack on you”, where the “you” was “Republican voters”.
Even though her voting record is relatively moderate compared to most of her GOP counterparts, Elise Stefanik is not without her own track record of disappointing votes:
- January 22nd, 2015: Elise Stefanik votes for HR 7, an anti-abortion bill that makes even some Republicans pause before voting for it because of its language that tries to define the conditions for what “rape” is, in it.
- February 3rd, 2015: Rep. Stefanik votes for the 60th Republican attempt at repealing the Affordable Care Act. This in spite of the fact that the law is not just working, but better than experts predicted.
- March 3rd, 2015: Stefanik votes against funding the Department of Homeland Security as part of a Republican protest of President Obama’s executive orders on immigration.
- September 11th, 2015: Stefanik votes against the United States’ nuclear treaty with Iran.
- September 18th, 2015: Rep. Stefanik co-sponsors and votes for a bill with most House Republicans to defund Planned Parenthood, based on highly edited “sting” videos submitted by a Pro-Life advocacy group that have been repeatedly debunked by investigators.
- November 19th, 2015: Stefanik votes for the American Security Against Foreign Enemies Act, reacting to the terror attacks in Paris by jihadists from France and Belgium by trying to create greater restrictions to keep out Syrian refugees, of whom exactly zero were involved in those attacks.
- February 2nd, 2016: Elise Stefanik votes for HR 3762, the 61st attempt by Congressional Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act (which is still working better than was predicted).
- February 16th, 2017: Stefanik votes for HJR 69, to make it legal for hunters on wildlife reserves to kill several species of hibernating bears or wolves while they’re sleeping. Because… well, the logic really isn’t there as to why, it’s just awful.
- March 16th, 2017: Elise Stefanik votes for HR 1181, which would allow veterans deemed mentally incompetent to continue to own firearms, and not have them taken away without a judge’s written order.
- May 4th, 2017: Stefanik votes for the GOP’s healthcare plan, that would allow 24,000 more people to die a year, give $50,000 in tax breaks to millionaires, would eliminate coverage for pre-existing conditions, and would treat pregnancy, post-partum depression, and sexual assault as “pre-existing conditions”. Oh, and a provision in the bill would make sure that Stefanik would be allowed to keep his healthcare plan as it exists under the ACA, which would be repealed for the rest of the country. She and her Republican compatriots threw themselves a beer bash to celebrate taking away healthcare from millions and then gloated about it with Donald Trump at a White House press conference, as well.
- June 8th, 2017: Elise Stefanik votes for HR 10, the GOP’s attempt to repeal Dodd-Frank financial reform, because what the country really needs is to allow the big banks to make the same mistakes that imploded the economy only a decade earlier.
- October 3rd, 2017: Stefanik votes for HR 36, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, that would try to create an unconstitutional ban abortion at 20 weeks (even though medical science tells us fetuses do not have the capability to feel pain until 29 weeks).
- February 18th, 2018: Rep. Stefanik and her fellow Republicans decide that poor big businesses are suffering too much at the hands of the Americans with Disabilities Act too much, and votes for HR 620, which would strip most of the civil rights protections guaranteed by it.
- February 28th, 2019: Stefanik votes against HR 1112, a bill which would have required universal background checks on all firearm purchases, and close the gun show loophole.
- April 4th, 2019: Elise Stefanik is one of 158 Republicans who choose to vote against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
- June 4th, 2019: Rep. Stefanik votes against the Dreamers Act, because she’s too xenophobic and partisan to care about immigration reform.
- July 16th, 2019: Elise Stefanik votes against a resolution to condemn Donald Trump for his racist statements that four people of color in Congress should “go back where they came from”.
- December 18th, 2019: Stefanik ignores her Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the impeachment of Donald Trump.
- May 15th, 2020: Stefanik votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Stefanik is already posturing herself to be a recruiter of Republican women to run for office, which she kind of has to by default, what with her being only one of nine women in the GOP caucus currently. New York’s 21st Congressional District only has a +4 Republican lean in the Cook Partisan Voting Index, although it covers most of the Adirondack Mountains and is more likely to support Donald Trump than the rest of the state. Her November opponent is Tedra Cobb, who lost to Elise Stefanik in 2018 by 14 points. Given Stefanik’s impressive fundraising haul, even with the disastrous GOP strategy thus far in the 2020 election cycle, she’ll be hard pressed to overcome it and flip this seat. Should Cobb miss the opportunity, district realignment after this election for 2022 could still be what takes Stefanik down.
One Year Ago, September 5th, 2019: Antonio Sabato, Jr. (CA)
Two Years Ago, September 5th, 2018: Paul Nehlen (WI)…2018 Update
Three Years Ago, September 5th, 2017: Paul Nehlen (WI)…Original Profile
Four Years Ago, September 5th, 2016: Matthew Erickson (MN)
Five Years Ago, September 5th, 2015: Michelle Bachmann (MN)… 2015 Update
Six Years Ago, September 5th, 2014: Michelle Bachmann (MN)…Original Profile
