Rep. Lauren Underwood
Representative for Illinois’s 14th District
pronounced LAW-run // UN-der-wuud
![Photo of Rep. Lauren Underwood [D-IL14]](/static/legislator-photos/412776-200px.jpeg)
Earmarks
Underwood proposed $17 million in earmarks for fiscal year 2024, including:
- $2.5 million to Safe Passage Inc. for “Building New Beginnings Emergency Shelter for Victims of Violence in DeKalb County, Illinois”
- $1.9 million to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Chicago District for “Lockport, Illinois”
- $1.6 million to Village of Romeoville for “Village of Romeoville Spangler Sanitary Lift Station Replacement”
View all requests and justifications on Underwood’s website »
View analysis and download spreadsheet from Demand Progress Education Fund »
These are earmark requests which may or may not survive the legislative process to becoming law. Most representatives from both parties requested earmarks for fiscal year 2024. Across representatives who requested earmarks, the median total amount requested for this fiscal year was $39 million.
Earmarks are federal expenditures, tax benefits, or tariff benefits requested by a legislator for a specific entity. Rather than being distributed through a formula or competitive process administered by the executive branch, earmarks may direct spending where it is most needed for the legislator's district. All earmark requests in the House of Representatives are published online for the public to review. We don’t have earmark requests for senators. The fiscal year begins on October 1 of the prior calendar year. Source: Appropriations.house.gov. Background: Earmark Disclosure Rules in the House
Analysis
Ideology–Leadership Chart
Underwood is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot is a member of the House of Representatives positioned according to our ideology score (left to right) and our leadership score (leaders are toward the top).
The chart is based on the bills Underwood has sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 3, 2019 to May 23, 2024. See full analysis methodology.
Committee Membership
Lauren Underwood sits on the following committees:
Enacted Legislation
Underwood was the primary sponsor of 5 bills that were enacted:
- H.R. 5575 (117th): VA Nurse and Physician Assistant RAISE Act
- H.R. 958 (117th): Protecting Moms Who Served Act
- H.R. 2372 (116th): Veterans’ Care Quality Transparency Act
- H.R. 6140 (116th): Veterans in STEM Act
- H.R. 5444 (116th): Lower Insulin Costs Now Act
Does 5 not sound like a lot? Very few bills are ever enacted — most legislators sponsor only a handful that are signed into law. But there are other legislative activities that we don’t track that are also important, including offering amendments, committee work and oversight of the other branches, and constituent services.
We consider a bill enacted if one of the following is true: a) it is enacted itself, b) it has a companion bill in the other chamber (as identified by Congress) which was enacted, or c) if at least about half of its provisions were incorporated into bills that were enacted (as determined by an automated text analysis, applicable beginning with bills in the 110th Congress).
Bills Sponsored
Issue Areas
Underwood sponsors bills primarily in these issue areas:
Health (45%) Armed Forces and National Security (28%) Taxation (6%) Labor and Employment (6%) Education (6%)
Recently Introduced Bills
Underwood recently introduced the following legislation:
- H.R. 8520: To amend the Public Health Service Act to require the Secretary of Health …
- H.R. 8418: To direct the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to update the Lethal Means Safety …
- H.R. 8037: NIH IMPROVE Act
- H.R. 7892: Student Loan Contract Act of 2024
- H.R. 7346: Climate and Health Protection Act
- H.R. 7265: Child Suicide Prevention and Lethal Means Safety Act
- H.R. 7266: FAAN Act
View All » | View Cosponsors »
Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.
Voting Record
Key Votes
Missed Votes
From Jan 2019 to May 2024, Underwood missed 22 of 2,908 roll call votes, which is 0.8%. This is better than the median of 2.0% among the lifetime records of representatives currently serving. The chart below reports missed votes over time.
We don’t track why legislators miss votes, but it’s often due to medical absenses, major life events, and running for higher office.
Primary Sources
The information on this page is originally sourced from a variety of materials, including:
- unitedstates/congress-legislators, a community project gathering congressional information
- The House and Senate websites, for committee membership and voting records
- Office of Lauren Underwood for the photo
- GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills
