Ohio’s federal delegation a mixed bag on the environment: too many lawmakers continue to put polluter profits over Ohio families

Read the full scorecard in English and Spanish

Lea la tarjeta nacional de evaluaciones completa en Inglés y Español

The Ohio Environmental Council Action Fund today unveiled scores for the Ohio delegation released this morning as part of the League of Conservation Voters (LCV) 2016 National Environmental Scorecard. The Scorecard includes 17 votes in the Senate and 38 House votes.

The Scorecard is available in both English and Spanish at scorecard.lcv.org.

“Once again, too many of Ohio’s lawmakers were complicit in extreme attacks on cornerstone environmental laws that protect our air, water, wildlife and public lands,” said OEC Action Fund President Heather Taylor-Miesle. “Despite last year bringing environmental and public health tragedies like the Flint, Michigan and Sebring, Ohio water crises, many of our lawmakers stood on the sidelines, or actively pursued anti-environment agendas at the expense of our communities.”

In fact, these anti-environment attacks have only escalated in early 2017. Congressmen Bill Johnson (R-OH 6th District) and Bob Gibbs (R-OH 7th District)  both cosponsored a recently-passed bill that repealed modest, sorely-needed protections for Ohioans’ drinking water from irresponsible mining activity. Both Johnson and Gibbs have lifetime LCV scores of zero.

While a number of Ohio’s decision makers remain more committed to polluter profits than public health, there are several bright spots. Our environmental allies are becoming more vocal and even more committed to securing clean air and water, public lands, climate science, wildlife, and more.

One of these allies is Senator Sherrod Brown, who scored a perfect 100. Senator Brown recently voted against the nomination of climate-denying, fossil-fuel industry ally Scott Pruitt as EPA head. In contrast, Senator Rob Portman voted to confirm Scott Pruitt despite the public’s overwhelming opposition. Senator Portman received a score of 35 for his 2016 votes. Despite several very bad decisions, his score is higher than other Republican Senators. He has demonstrated some willingness to work on issues related to Lake Erie protection and restoration.

The 2016 Scorecard is being released at a time when attacks on the environment are already coming fast and furious from polluter allies in both the Trump administration and Congress. While the attacks contained in the 2016 Scorecard were largely prevented from becoming law thanks to opposition in the Senate and the President’s veto pen, those attacks serve as a preview of what’s at stake.

In Ohio, four House members and one Senator earned a score of 80 percent or greater on the 2016 Scorecard, while 12 House members earned an abysmal score of 10 percent or less. The average House score in 2016 for Ohio was 26 percent and the average Senate score was 68 percent.

A COMPLETE LIST OF THE OHIO DELEGATION BELOW:

Senate

  • Brown, 100

  • Portman, 35

House

  • Chabot, 0

  • Wenstrup, 0

  • Beatty, 100

  • Jordan, 0

  • Latta, 0

  • Johnson, B, 0

  • Gibbs, B, 0

  • Davidson, 0

  • Kaptur, 100

  • Turner, 11

  • Fudge, 100

  • Tiberi, 0

  • Ryan, T, 100

  • Joyce, R

  • Stivers, 3

  • Renacci, 0

For over 40 years, the National Environmental Scorecard issued by LCV has been the nationally accepted yardstick used to rate members of Congress on environmental, public health, and energy issues. For more information, visit http://scorecard.lcv.org.