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Rep. Joe Wilson

Representative for South Carolina’s 2nd District

pronounced joh // WIL-sun

Wilson is the representative for South Carolina’s 2nd congressional district (view map) and is a Republican. He has served since Dec 18, 2001. Wilson is next up for reelection in 2024 and serves until Jan 3, 2025. He is 77 years old.

Photo of Rep. Joe Wilson [R-SC2]
Elections must be decided by counting votes

Our work to hold Congress accountable only matters if elections are decided by counting votes. President Trump, his advisors and associates, and Republican legislators collaborated to have the 2020 presidential election decided by themselves rather than by voters through their attempts to suppress state-certified election results at both the state and national level.

Wilson was among the Republican legislators who participated in this. Shortly after the election, Wilson joined a case before the Supreme Court calling for all the votes for president in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin — states that were narrowly won by Democrats — to be discarded, in order to change the outcome of the election. In the case, Republicans proffered lies and a novel legal theory which the Supreme Court rejected. (Following the rejection of several related cases before the Supreme Court, another legislator who joined the case called for violence.) On January 6, 2021 in the hours after the violent insurrection at the Capitol, Wilson voted to omit Arizona and/or Pennsylvania from the counting of presidential electors, which could have altered the outcome of the election in Trump’s favor.
In 2023, Trump associates and top advisors pleaded guilty to submitting a fraudulent slate of electors to Congress from Georgia, making false statements about purported widespread fraud in the election, and tampering with voting machines after the election, admitted in civil court to posing as fake electors in Wisconsin, and were convicted of contempt of Congress for withholding documents during its investigation and assaulting police officers at the Capitol. Trump associates and top advisors are also facing charges for submitting fraudulent slates of electors to Congress (in Michigan, Nevada, Arizona, and Wisconsin) and Trump himself faces criminal charges for coordinating the fraudulent slates of electors and other actions. He was also convicted in 2024 of falsifying business records to cover up acts that he believed might have hurt him in the 2016 election. The January 6, 2021 violent insurrection at the Capitol, led on the front lines by militant white supremacy groups one member of which was convicted of sedition, attempted to prevent President-elect Joe Biden from taking office by disrupting Congress’s count of electors.

Earmarks

Wilson did not request any earmarks for fiscal year 2024.

Most representatives from both parties requested earmarks for fiscal year 2024. 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. More about FY2024 earmark requests from Demand Progress Education Fund »

Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Wilson 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 Wilson has sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 3, 2019 to Aug 20, 2024. See full analysis methodology.

Committee Membership

Joe Wilson sits on the following committees:

Enacted Legislation

Wilson was the primary sponsor of 7 bills that were enacted:

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Does 7 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

Wilson sponsors bills primarily in these issue areas:

International Affairs (70%) Armed Forces and National Security (16%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Wilson recently introduced the following legislation:

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Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

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Voting Record

Key Votes

Wilson voted Yea

Wilson voted Aye

Wilson voted Nay

Wilson voted Yea

Passed 297/117 on May 8, 2014.

Wilson voted No

Passed 269/161 on Aug 1, 2011.
The Budget Control Act of 2011 (Pub.L. 112–25, S. 365, 125 Stat. 240, enacted August 2, 2011) is a federal statute enacted by the 112th …

Wilson voted Aye

Passed 304/117 on Jun 23, 2011.
The Leahy–Smith America Invents Act (AIA) is a United States federal statute that was passed by Congress and was signed into law by President Barack …

Wilson voted Yea

Passed 326/92 on Jul 21, 2010.
The Tribal Law and Order Act of 2010 is a law, signed into effect by President Obama, that expands the punitive abilities of tribal courts …

Wilson voted Aye

Missed Votes

From Dec 2001 to Jul 2024, Wilson missed 315 of 14,880 roll call votes, which is 2.1%. This is on par with the median of 2.1% 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.

Show the numbers...

Primary Sources

The information on this page is originally sourced from a variety of materials, including: