Cory Gardner’s most recent ad highlights incumbent Sen. Mark Udall’s on-the-job attendance record, which leaves something to be desired.
Though Udall talks tough on terrorism, the new spot points out that he has been “absent for over half the public hearings in the Senate Armed Services Committee” and “absent for all public hearings on emerging threats.”
There are plenty of members who read a prepared script at hearings and ask the questions that committee staff has written for them and go home. Even that would be better than Udall’s approach of getting marked absent.
By comparison, Gardner not only shows up for work but he is probably one of the most feared members of Congress a federal bureaucrat could find himself or herself testifying before. If you work at the EPA, for example, and get called to testify before the Energy and Commerce Committee, you better hope to god that Gardner is home sick that day.
Gardner pulls no punches and uses his office to advance policies that protect jobs, limit government waste, and repeal burdensome regulations. This clip is an oldie but a goody and shows Gardner getting an EPA administrator to admit that jobs don’t matter:
We just can’t see Udall matching Gardner’s effectiveness in this way. In fact, we just can’t see Udall at all because he’s always absent.