Congress had a no-good, very bad year.
As the 118th Congress winds down the first of its two-year session, it’s abundantly clear that this latest iteration has come up shockingly short, passing just 20 bills through both chambers, according to Quorum legislative data analyzed by Axios. Four additional bills are currently waiting Biden’s signature.
That’s drastically lower than previous congresses, which tallied far above 50 bills in their first year and typically passed between 300 and 450 laws.
This year’s congressional report card sank below even some of Congress’s most unproductive years, reported Axios, including the 104th, 112th, and 11th Congresses, which saw Republicans controlling the House or Senate during Bill Clinton and Barack Obama’s presidencies. Still, those sessions managed to pass between 70 and 73 laws.
The abysmal productivity is thanks, in large part, to historic divisions and tensions among Republicans, who are still holding on to a slim majority, effectively necessitating unanimous consent to pass sections of their agenda.
The House has also failed to come up with budgetary solutions as the government stares down another looming government shutdown just weeks after it comes back from Christmas break.
The majority of bills that were able to slip through the cracks this year were unsurprisingly uncontroversial. Those included measures to rename Veterans Affairs clinics and to mint a coin commemorating the 250th anniversary of the Marine Corps, noted Axios.
Republicans also managed to waste the better part of two months over the last year, unable to pick a leader. Given the upcoming election, it’s unlikely that next year will prove more productive.
The GOP also chose to waste time on the impeachment of President Joe Biden, which even Republican lawmakers admitted failed to tie the president to any wrongdoing, let alone illegal activity.