MEMBER OF CONGRESS

James Lankford

Republican OK 5 statements translated

James Lankford, a Republican senator from Oklahoma, often argues from historical and procedural detail—as in his floor history of the Hyde amendment—and pushes back on Democratic election bills by defending voter ID as a bipartisan, cross-party practice. He frequently objects to bills on procedural grounds, saying they have solvable problems that should be worked out in committee. His most distinctive habit is that he often answers something other than the question asked: debate about a stock-trading bill repeatedly turns into extended remarks on voter ID, and debate on an appropriations bill turns into a history lesson, drifting well past the subject at hand. He supports his arguments with lists of facts (states with voter ID, vote counts) rather than emotional language, and he generally avoids taking personal credit or assigning personal blame, though he can be pointed about his colleagues’ tactics.Written by AI from their statements. Updated 2026-10-17.

Average grade

B–

71 / 100 over 4 statements

Signal 70 / 100

Relevance Not scored

Reasoning 66 / 100

Respect 100 / 100

Clarity 100 / 100

Averaged over the 4 of 5 statements graded so far.

In their own words

Loses points more than most for

A conclusion stated with no reason given for it.6 times as often as most members.What the tags mean ×6.0

Thanks and tributes.1.8 times as often as most members.What the tags mean ×1.8

Throat-clearing: announcing what you are about to say, or the House’s routine business.1.7 times as often as most members.What the tags mean ×1.7

Loses points less than most for Praise, blame or attack with no claim, reason or ask in it.Less often than most members.What the tags mean

Statements 5

Senate · 2026-09-30

License to Drill Act

“Fifty years ago today, Congress passed the Hyde amendment to stop federal tax dollars from paying for elective abortions. Both parties supported it then, and Congress has renewed it every year since. Studies show 2.5 million people are alive today because of this law. I want us to remember this rule and keep protecting human life.”

“Mr. President, I thank my colleagues for allowing me to be able to slip in and do a quick history moment on the floor of the Senate. It is an interesting day, the 30th of September 2026. Fifty years ago today, there was the passage of an appropriations bill that was just another appropriations bill, except this one was a little harder because it was actually a veto override. Let me set the context for you. In 1973, the Supreme Court ruled on something called Roe v. Wade. For the previous 200 years as a country, every State made a decision about abortion. That was the way it worked. In 1973, the Supreme Court stepped in and said: Nope, every State has to allow abortion across their State, and changed what we had been as a nation for 200 years to a nation that required an abortion in every single State. Well, that was in 1973. In 1976, Congress--both House and Senate--had a serious conversation about are we going to fund abortion with Federal dollars. At the time, just to give you some history context on this, Carl Albert was the Speaker of the House. A Democrat from Oklahoma was actually the Speaker of the House. The majority leader of the Senate was also a Democrat. This was a Democrat-led House and Senate. They debated it, and out of the House came an amendment called the Hyde amendment. It was named after Henry Hyde, who worked across the aisle and said: We may disagree on this issue of abortion that just came from the Supreme Court 3 years ago, but we should agree that we shouldn’t allow Federal funding for abortion. So a Democrat-led House of Representatives passed an amendment in the appropriations bill in 1976 which we still call the Hyde amendment today. It is interesting to be able to think about, at that time, in Congress, of the 535 Members of Congress, there were 100 pro-life Democrat Members of Congress. Now, 50 years later, there is one pro- life Democrat Member of Congress. A lot has changed in that time period. But this simple agreement that we should not use Federal dollars to pay for elective abortions; that when I pay my taxes on April 15, it shouldn’t be to pay for someone’s abortion down the street--that was the agreement that was set in 1976. Now, interestingly enough, it passed in that appropriations bill in the House. It was sent over to the Senate and passed in the Senate. It went to the President of the United States. It was a Republican President--Gerald Ford--at the time. He vetoed it, and it came back to Congress. And with 313 votes in the House of Representatives, they overrode President Ford’s veto to pass that appropriations bill, including the Hyde amendment, on September 30, 1976, 50 years ago today. I just thought, for just a moment, in all the chaos and of all the stuff and lots of important things that we are trying to be able to resolve today, for just a moment, we should just pause and remember the 50 years that we have had this simple agreement. Every single year since then, we have had this simple agreement: We will not use Federal dollars that come from taxpayers to pay for elective abortions across the country. Some of us are still crazy enough to believe every child is valuable. We don’t believe and I don’t believe that some children are disposable and some children are valuable. I think they are all valuable. And I think there is some great value in telling the American taxpayers: You don’t pay for the taking of human life; you pay for research from NIH and other things to be able to protect human life. That seems to be a better value. Interestingly enough, studies have been done showing that 2.5 million children are alive today because of the Hyde amendment that passed 50 years ago. Those are folks teaching in schools; those are police officers; those are folks working in manufacturing; those are small business owners all across our country--2.5 million of them--that are alive today, just living life, doing their stuff, because the Hyde amendment passed 50 years ago. And it still gets passed every year. I just thought for just a moment, in the Senate, we should pause and remember that day. I yield the floor.”

Senate · 2026-09-30

Taxpayer Assistance and Service Act

“I oppose this bill as it is written. Both Democratic and Republican states require voter ID to keep elections safe. It does not stop Native Americans or married women from voting. This bill has real problems, and we should send it to committee to fix it together.”

“I oppose this bill as it is written. I got my facts by reading the bill itself, not from an outside group. The bill would force farmers and small business owners to sell their family businesses to serve in the Senate. If anyone is illegally talking to their blind trust manager, report them to the Ethics Committee now, because that is already against the law. Finally, voter ID laws are not racist. We need to follow the normal process and write a better bill.”

“Madam President, I appreciate the conversation from my colleague. I look forward to getting a chance to be able to work on the bill that is actually complete. He asked where I got my information from that I actually listed out on this. I got it from a ``secret source,’’ the 31 pages of the text of his bill. There was no outside group. I appreciate the conspiracy theory that some secret group must have manipulated it somehow and given me the information. I just read the text. There are issues with the text. Again, we are back to--we can’t have farmers on the Ag Committee and small business owners who may have to get rid of their family businesses to be able to run in the Senate. That is a problem. As far as the accusation of the qualified blind trust and that there is someone who has said to my colleague that they talk to their qualified blind trust person every quarter, I would encourage my colleague to submit that to the Ethics Committee because that is a violation of current statute, if that is actually occurring, and it is already a violation. So, if my colleague knows of someone who is interacting with their broker and they have a qualified blind trust and they are interacting, as he claims, every month or every quarter, please let us know because that is something the bipartisan Ethics Committee would address immediately because that is already against Federal law to be able to do that. My simple statement for today is: Listen, there is a right way to be able to do this. Let’s do it. Let’s go through the process. Let’s actually figure out how to be able to get this done and get it done right, but this is not it. The way this bill is written has so many problems within the bill that I have to come down as the chairman of Ethics to say I would have to be the one charged to actually enforce this, and there will be major problems with this. As far as the voting issues, I was listening with wonder on all of the issues about problems with voter ID. Apparently, my colleague believes that, if you have voter ID, you are Jim Crow 2.0; you are a racist State. Well, I am confident the folks in Rhode Island would be shocked to hear that.”

Speech in the House

Reasoning 20 of 100

This statement drew 5 conclusions, but gave no reasons for 4 of them.
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“I am blocking this bill. I agree that members of Congress should not trade stocks. But this bill goes too far. It could force lawmakers to sell their family farms or small businesses. It also bans blind trusts and digital dollars. The Senate should send this bill to a committee so we can fix it.”

“Madam President, reserving the right to object--I would like to reserve the right to object on this. My friend came with a proposal to try to ban the sale and ownership of stocks by Members of Congress. I am pretty confident of why this came up today, because earlier today, we had a vote in this body to ban Members of Congress from owning stock--or, I am sorry, buying and selling stock on it. But it also included what the vast majority of Americans also want and that is voter ID. It is pretty simple and straightforward. It is a very short bill. It just mandated voter ID, and it also banned Members of Congress from buying and selling stock: short bill, straightforward, easy to read, uncomplicated language. Now, every one of my Democrat colleagues voted against that bill, and their complaint was: It is because it is going to rig elections if you require voter ID. Well, I would like to remind this body, the Chair, that 36 of our 50 states already have voter ID; exactly what we voted on. There is only 14 States that don’t, which means 72 Senators in this body already serve in a State that has voter ID. This is not a complicated, highly politicized, red versus blue issue. This is Americans that just say: Hey, we show ID to do everything. Why don’t we show an ID to vote? In fact, the vast majority of countries around the world are completely confused by Americans, that we don’t show ID to be able to vote, when most countries around the world do. It is not diminishing people’s right to vote. This is acknowledging the reality of where 36 States already are--red and blue--that we show voter ID. It shouldn’t be an issue. But this particular bill that is being brought today, and the response that Democrats voting against the bill earlier today, it is different. This is not just a ``can’t buy and sell stocks’’--which I, by the way, totally agree with. That is why I wholeheartedly voted for the bill earlier today. This one has some additional features in it that have not been discussed here on the floor that I think we should actually put out onto the floor. This bill itself also includes requirements for the Ethics Committee--which I happen to chair--which is a bipartisan, equally represented group here in the Senate that has to evaluate all this. So I am pretty attentive to bills that actually deal with this to know: How are we going to implement this? So this includes a requirement for small businesses and family farms and all those, that the Ethics Committee has to come and evaluate every single one of those from every Member to determine if there is going to be a conflict of interest from them owning a family farm. So let me give you an example. If you own a family farm, you can’t be on the Agriculture Committee because that becomes a conflict of interest. So the Agriculture Committee in the U.S. Senate suddenly becomes a group of people that don’t know anything about ag because this bill would force them to divest from their family farm or it becomes a conflict of interest in the Senate. I, personally, don’t want everybody on the Ag Committee to not be farmers. I would like to have some farmers on the Ag Committee and some people that know something about this. If you own a family-owned business that is not a family farm, that is just an LLC--which it is typical for most family businesses to be incorporated as an LLC--this puts an additional requirement on them on any kind of securities ownership, which is pretty common in an LLC that anyone who serves in this body that has a family business, multigenerational business, may have to divest from that to be able to come into the U.S. Senate. That would mean Senators can’t come from a small, family-owned business. That puts out a lot of Americans that suddenly wouldn’t be eligible to serve in the U.S. Senate. This bill also prohibits what is called a qualified blind trust. It is one of the most misunderstood aspects of this. A QBT--a qualified blind trust--any Senator that is here that has a stock portfolio that is larger has the ability to be able to take all of those assets, put it into a qualified blind trust, and they are prohibited by law from talking to that person that is actually doing all the investments. They can’t know what is in it; they can’t get updates on it; they can’t have any interaction. And it is called a qualified blind trust because we actually have to qualify that. In fact, the Ethics Committee actually engages with everyone who has a qualified blind trust and the person that is there to actually get all communications. So we literally monitor that to be able to make sure there is no interaction on that. Well, this bill would actually prohibit this. This bill would also prohibit digital assets. Well, I understand that for investment in cryptocurrency and Bitcoin and everything else, but there is also a digital asset called stablecoins, and this body actually passed that. Stablecoins aren’t an investment piece; stablecoins are just a dollar in digital form. That is all that it is. This bill would prohibit Members of the Senate from actually having a digital dollar because it would be now considered a new investment asset, when it is not an investment asset at all. I wish this bill would have gone through committee. There is a lot we could have discussed in committee to be able to work this through. But this bill skipped all the committees and has had no hearing in committees to actually talk through it because there is even a section in this bill where it talks about one section where the Secretary of the Senate does the reporting, or another aspect where the Ethics Committee is doing the reporting. Some of those little pieces could be worked out in committee. That is not controversial at all; it could be worked out. But it hasn’t actually gone through committee to actually have any kind of oversight to try to figure out how to be able to perfect some of these areas. Listen, this is not a bill that is just about ownership of stocks and buying and selling stocks. It is much larger. It gets into family farms. It gets into small businesses. It gets into stablecoin. It gets into all those different aspects on this. This is the reason that, when we brought a stock bill earlier today, it is a short couple-of-pages bill to be able to make it very clear what it is and what it is not. It was not this 31-page very complicated bill that is actually being brought to the floor today. So my challenge to all of my colleagues are: We should not be trading stocks. And if you have got stocks, those need to either be divested or put into some blind trust so that Americans have full trust that Members of this body are not looking at their portfolio all the time; they are actually looking at the people that live in their State and what they can do best to be able to serve them. That is where my colleague and I adamantly agree. Where we disagree is on this text and what it does that is far beyond what is actually being advertised that it does. So I would be very willing to be able to work with my colleague to be able to figure out how we can get this right because I think it is an incredibly important issue, but this needs more work back in the kitchen. So with that, I object.”

Senate · 2026-07-13

Remembering Lindsey Graham

“We miss Lindsey Graham, and I am praying for his family, his staff, and the people of South Carolina as they grieve. I also pray for his sister, Darline, as she takes his seat in the Senate.”

“Mr. President, a lot of words have been said today about our colleague Lindsey Graham and his passing. As the Presiding Officer knows well, where my desk sits, I literally sit and stand directly behind Lindsey’s chair--where right now there is a black drape and white roses--where he should be today, but he is not. We miss our colleague. We miss his humor. We miss his ideas. We miss his insight on a lot of things, his passion for Israel, his passion for national defense, his passion for the life of the unborn, his passion for this body, for our Nation, and for South Carolina. As much as we miss him here, we also understand full well there is a lot of grieving in South Carolina and especially with his family and with Darline, who will be here tomorrow, being sworn in to this body as she takes her seat, literally sitting in the same chair he was sitting in 2 weeks ago. So I thought it would be appropriate that we do more than just talk about him. Many of us have actually shared. We are praying for his family, we are praying for his staff, and we are praying for the folks around him. So I thought it would be appropriate here in this body that we don’t just talk about him but that we actually fulfill the words that are on the wall in our building where it says ``In God We Trust’’ and just to take a moment to just express that. I am going to take just a moment to be able to pray for Lindsey’s family: Father, I do ask that You would help Darline and help the whole family right now as they grieve and struggle through this: the 10 million emotions that she has to feel right now with the loss of her brother and with the responsibility of coming to this body to hold this spot for months. I pray that You give her the strength that she needs, the insight that she will need in the days ahead, and that You would comfort her as she grieves. For all of Lindsey’s family and so many friends, for his staff, God, we ask that You would fulfill what Your word says in Psalm 34:18, where it says that You are ``[near] to the brokenhearted,’’ and You ``[save] those who are crushed in spirit.’’ We count on that today, Father, because this body will need Your help. Lindsey’s family needs Your nearness. The people of South Carolina and so many friends will need that. So, Father, help us as we grieve and help us to be able to honor You in the days ahead. God, I am grateful that You are the One who cares for each of us and that You can be trusted every day. So we are grateful for that. So help us, guide us in the days ahead to do things well and to be able to honor You in our work. That is what we ask in the Name of Jesus. Amen. I remember the first week that I came into this body. Lindsey caught me just in a random conversation, and he said: You and I are the only Southern Baptists that are in the Senate now. Then he smiled at me and said: You should probably talk about that more than I do. And I have never forgotten that whole conversation. That was just classic Lindsey. He is a person that loved this body. He loved the country. He loved the people of South Carolina, and it showed. And as we grieve, I pray that we grieve together and that we go again and again and again to the source that hears our grieving and that meets us in our pain. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.”

Speech in the House

Signal 13 of 100

Much of this statement went to praise, blame, greetings, routine procedure or general stories rather than reasons, requests or specific points.
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