RightDataUSA


Filemon Vela

[Congressional biography]

Born: February 13, 1963 in Harlingen, TX

Education:

  • St. Joseph's Academy (Brownsville, TX), 1981
  • Georgetown University, B.A., 1985
  • University of Texas, J.D., 1987

Career:

  • Lawyer


Election Results for Filemon Vela


Click on the Year to see the results of that election.

YearAgeStatePartyOfficeDistrictStagePosVotes%
2012 49 TX D U.S. House District 34 Primary 1 18,233 40.5%
2012 49 TX D U.S. House District 34 Primary Runoff 1 15,628 66.6%
2012 49 TX D U.S. House District 34 General 1 89,606 61.9%
2014 51 TX D U.S. House District 34 Primary 1 26,237 100.0%
2014 51 TX D U.S. House District 34 General 1 47,503 59.5%
2016 53 TX D U.S. House District 34 Primary 1 41,414 100.0%
2016 53 TX D U.S. House District 34 General 1 104,638 62.7%
2018 55 TX D U.S. House District 34 Primary 1 25,344 100.0%
2018 55 TX D U.S. House District 34 General 1 85,825 60.0%
2020 57 TX D U.S. House District 34 Primary 1 39,484 75.1%
2020 57 TX D U.S. House District 34 General 1 111,439 55.4%


Age: Age as of July 1 of the year pertaining to this election.



Ideology Data for Filemon Vela


Click on the number in the 'Conserv.' column to see all of the key votes for that year.

YearAgeBodyConservative
Coalition		Party UnityPresidential
Support		Vote %LiberalConserv.
P
2013 50 House 79 20 D 70 30 99 60 12
2014 51 House 82 13 D 65 33 96 58 8
2015 52 House 88 12 D 73 26 99 70 8
2016 53 House 84 13 D 60 38 96 79 4
2017 54 House 91 8 R 19 78 99 80 15
2018 55 House 84 11 R 44 48 87 70 13
2019 56 House 96 3 R 10 90 99 85 3
2020 57 House 97 1 R 6 94 97 84 4
2021 58 House 95 2 D 100 0 94 80 8
2022 59 House 18 1 D 33 0 18 0
Lifetime conservative rating:   8%


Age: Age as of July 1 of the year pertaining to this row.


Conservative Coalition: According to the publication "Congressional Quarterly" (CQ), this is an alliance of Republicans and Southern Democrats (from back when Southern Democrats tended to be conservative or at least moderate) against Northern Democrats in Congress.

This concept had significant meaning perhaps through the 1980's. These statistics stopped being computed after 2000 because conservative Democrats no longer existed except in very rare cases. The number under the green check is the percentage of time this Representative or Senator voted with the coalition; the number under the red X is the percentage of the time he opposed the coalition. The numbers often do not add to 100% because of instances where no vote was cast.


Party Unity: According to CQ, a Party Unity vote in Congress is one in which the parties were split, with a majority of Democrats opposing a majority of Republicans.

The number under the green check is the percentage of time this Representative or Senator voted with his party; the number under the red X is the percentage of the time he opposed the party. The numbers often do not add to 100% because of instances where no vote was cast.


Presidential Support: These are votes for which the President has stated his position, either in via a message to Congress, by press conference remarks or other public statements and documents.

The number under the green check is the percentage of time this Representative or Senator voted with the President; the number under the red X is the percentage of the time he opposed the President. The numbers often do not add to 100% because of instances where no vote was cast. The "P" column indicates the party of the President in each year.


Vote %: The percentage of roll-call votes in which this Representaive or Senator participated by voting "Yes" or "No" (as opposed to "Present" or not voting at all.)


Liberal Rating: These ratings are based on key votes as identifed by the ultra-liberal advocacy organization called "Americans for Democratic Action" (ADA). They have been rating members of Congress since 1947. The number shown is the percentage of the time this Representative or Senator took the liberal position on a key issue. The methodology behind the calculation can be found here. Ratings followed by an asterisk were calculated the "ADA way" due to missing data regarding key votes in the ADA source material.


Conservative Rating: These ratings are based on key votes as identifed by the conservative advocacy organization called the "American Conservative Union" (ACU). They have been rating members of Congress since 1971. The number shown is the percentage of the time this Representative or Senator took the conservative position on a key issue.

The liberal and conservative ratings are not expected to add to 100% because the two groups use different sets of key votes to determine their ratings. Conservative ratings from 1961 through 1970 (and for 2024) were calculated based on key votes as selected by the creators of this website.