Summary: Technically correct, but misleading.
Analysis: The NRCC cites a Washington Post Vote Database to back up its claim that Congressman Bobby Bright, a Democrat, sides with Pelosi seven out of 10 times.
View the database here.
The database does show that Bright has voted with his party 71.8 percent of the time during this current Congressional term. However, Bright is far from a Pelosi puppet.
The same database shows that Bright is the second most independent member of Congress, Democrat or Republican. Bright is behind only Rep. Walt Minnick, D-Idaho, who votes with the party 70.9 percent of the time.
Additionally, the database has catalogued 1485 votes from Bright, many of them procedural in nature in which Democrats and Republicans vote the same. The Post database also breaks its numbers down into key votes, which indicates Bright has voted against the party position in most of the high-profile issues Congress has faced this term.
According to the Post database, Bright broke with the Democrats and voted no on health care reform, cap and trade, the repeal of the military "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell" policy, and the stimulus bill.
The NRCC –- and Bright’s Republican challenger Martha Roby -- have also criticized Bright for his first vote of the term, a vote for Pelosi as Speaker of House. Bright did vote for Pelosi as Speaker. Roby has said that despite Bright’s no votes on high-profile Democratic legislation, his failure to vote for Republican substitutes such as the substitute to the health care reform bill calls into question his self-described conservatism.
The NRCC’s claim in the ad running in the Second Congressional District is true on the numbers, but misleading in its connotations.
