Sen. Tammy BaldwinCertified

Election Legitimacy (30/30)

Baldwin has never disputed a certified election outcome, including her own. In 2024 she won re-election by a razor-thin 0.85% margin over Eric Hovde in a state Donald Trump carried at the presidential level; she won re-election to a third term by a narrow 0.85% margin, defeating Republican nominee Eric Hovde . Rather than dispute the outcome, she gave a victory speech and pledged to represent Wisconsinites “even if they voted for Trump,” a race that was called only after Milwaukee and Dane County ballots were fully tabulated.

She was present in the Senate chamber during the January 6, 2021 certification of the 2020 election and was among the members forced to shelter as rioters approached; as she recounted, before entering the Senate chambers to engage in debate, the second-term senator snapped a photo of the crowd flowing toward the Capitol, and a short time later she and several other members of Congress were “moments away” from encountering rioters that had stormed the Capitol . She subsequently pressed social media platforms on election misinformation ahead of the Jan. 6 anniversary, warning about reports that Meta’s response to the rise of online election-related misinformation and disinformation on its platforms, including Facebook, allowed misinformation and violent rhetoric to return following Election Day and in the lead-up to the January 6th insurrection . No search turned up any instance of Baldwin disputing a legitimate election result without evidence, in 2020, 2022, or 2024 — earning full marks.

Voting Rights (23/25)

Baldwin has a consistent record supporting expansive federal voting-rights legislation. She joined the reintroduction of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, legislation described as intended to restore the landmark Voting Rights Act (VRA) and stop the spreading scourge of voter suppression , with Baldwin stating she would keep working to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom to Vote Act so that we strengthen our democracy and put power in the hands of the people . She has also cosponsored the Freedom to Vote Act and pushed for it in the 2022 Senate voting-rights push covered by Wisconsin’s NPR affiliate. Her floor-vote diligence is strong: GovTrack finds she has missed only 23 of 4,996 roll call votes since 1999 (0.5%), better than the median of 2.8% among currently serving senators . A point is docked because, like most Senate Democrats, her preferred voting-rights bills have not become law due to the filibuster, and there is no unique bipartisan breakthrough on this specific front beyond party-line pushes.

Checks and Balances (22/25)

Baldwin has consistently supported congressional oversight of the executive branch across administrations of both parties. She called for a criminal DOJ investigation into the Tomah VA scandal under the Obama administration, and under the Trump administration she called for an independent Inspector General inquiry into Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, joining colleagues in calling on the Inspector General of the Commerce Department to open an independent inquiry into Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross’ compliance with ethics requirements , citing concerns about undisclosed wealth and recusal compliance. She backed the bipartisan Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act of 2022, which revises the process of casting and counting electoral votes for presidential elections and passed the Senate 68-29 as part of the year-end omnibus, a measure explicitly designed to prevent a repeat of the Jan. 6 attempt to subvert certification. She also publicly supported the 2019-2021 impeachment inquiries into President Trump, calling the process “appropriate action.” Points are deducted only for the general Senate Democratic tendency to sometimes prioritize party unity over the most robust independent-commission approaches to oversight, though no specific vote or statement undermining judicial independence or the subpoena power was found.

Conduct in Office (20/20)

No nonpartisan ethics body has found wrongdoing by Baldwin. Multiple ethics complaints filed against her by Wisconsin Republicans in 2015 over the firing of a staffer and handling of Tomah VA whistleblower allegations were dismissed by the Senate Select Committee on Ethics, which found these three complaints had been dismissed because they lacked merit . A more recent 2023 complaint from a conservative watchdog group alleging misuse of official travel funds for trips to New York was also dismissed, with the Senate Ethics Committee stating based on all available information, the Committee found no evidence that Baldwin’s actions violated federal law . Because both sets of complaints originated from partisan or opposition-aligned sources and were dismissed by the nonpartisan Ethics Committee itself, per the rubric this yields full marks — there is no finding of wrongdoing from a nonpartisan body to justify any deduction.

Bipartisan Cooperation (5/10)

Baldwin has some record of bipartisan work on democracy-adjacent legislation, most notably the DETER Act, a bill she cosponsored with Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) that uses the threat of powerful sanctions to dissuade hostile foreign powers from meddling in our elections , with Baldwin calling it an effort that “puts country over party, stands up for our democracy” . She also supported the bipartisan Electoral Count Reform Act, negotiated by Susan Collins (R-ME) and a bipartisan group of senators. However, her broader voting-rights push (Freedom to Vote Act, John Lewis VRAA) has been almost entirely along party lines with no Republican cosponsors, limiting the scope of demonstrated cross-aisle cooperation specifically on democracy/elections issues, which caps this bonus at a moderate level rather than the maximum.