Politics & Geography - Alabama: Senator Jeff Sessions [R]

Jefferson Beauregard "Jeff" Sessions III (born December 24, 1946) is the junior United States Senator from Alabama. First elected in 1996, Sessions is a member of the Republican Party. He serves as the ranking minority member on the Senate Budget Committee.

Raised in the town of Hybart in Monroe County, Alabama, Sessions graduated from Huntingdon College in Montgomery and the University of Alabama School of Law. In the 1970s he worked in private practice and rose to the rank of captain in the U.S. Army Reserve. From 1981 to 1993 he served as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Alabama. President Ronald Reagan nominated him to a judgeship on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Alabama in 1986, but the Senate confirmation failed after it was alleged that he had made racist remarks to a colleague. Sessions was elected to Attorney General of Alabama in 1994. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1996 and easily re-elected in 2002 and 2008. He and his colleague Richard Shelby are the state's first two-term Republican Senators since Reconstruction.

Sessions was ranked by National Journal in 2007 as the fifth-most conservative U.S. Senator, siding strongly with the Republican Party on political issues. He supported the major legislative efforts of the George W. Bush administration, including the 2001 and 2003 tax cut packages, the Iraq War, and a proposed national amendment to ban same-sex marriage. However, he was one of 25 senators to oppose the establishment of TARP. He has opposed the Democratic leadership since 2007 on most major legislation, including the stimulus bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act. Formerly the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, he opposed both of Obama's nominees for the Supreme Court.

Early life
Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III was born in Selma, Alabama, the son of Abbie (née Powe) and Jefferson Beauregard Sessions, Jr. His father owned a general store and then a farm equipment dealership. Both of Sessions' parents were of primarily English ancestry. Sessions grew up in the small town of Hybart. In 1964 he became an Eagle Scout. In his adult life, he became a recipient of the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award from the Boy Scouts of America.

After attending school in nearby Camden, Sessions studied at Huntingdon College in Montgomery, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1969. He was active in the Young Republicans and was student body president there. Sessions attended the University of Alabama School of Law and graduated with his J.D. in 1973.

Sessions entered private practice in Russellville and later in Mobile, where he now lives. He also served in the Army Reserve in the 1970s, achieving the rank of captain.

Sessions and his wife Mary have three grown children, Mary Abigail, Ruth Walk, and Sam, as well as three grandchildren, Jane Ritchie, Jim Beau and Grace.

Political career
U.S. Attorney
Sessions was an Assistant United States Attorney in the Office of the United States Attorney for the Southern District of Alabama beginning in 1975. In 1981, President Reagan nominated Sessions to be the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Alabama. The Senate confirmed him and he held that position for 12 years.

Failed nomination to the district court
In 1986, Reagan nominated Sessions to be a judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Alabama. Sessions was actively backed by Alabama Senator Jeremiah Denton, a Republican. A substantial majority of the American Bar Association Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary, which rates nominees to the federal bench, rated Sessions "qualified," with a minority voting that Sessions was "not qualified."

At Sessions' confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee, four Department of Justice lawyers who had worked with Sessions testified that he had made several racist statements. One of those lawyers, J. Gerald Hebert, testified that Sessions had referred to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) as "un-American" and "Communist-inspired" because they "forced civil rights down the throats of people."

Thomas Figures, a black Assistant U.S. Attorney, testified that Sessions said he thought the Klan was "OK until I found out they smoked pot." Figures also testified that on one occasion, when the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division sent the office instructions to investigate a case that Sessions had tried to close, Figures and Sessions "had a very spirited discussion regarding how the Hodge case should then be handled; in the course of that argument, Mr. Sessions threw the file on a table, and remarked, 'I wish I could decline on all of them,'" by which Figures said Sessions meant civil rights cases generally. After becoming Ranking Member of the Judiciary Committee, Sessions was asked in an interview about his civil rights record as a U.S Attorney. He denied that he had not sufficiently pursued civil rights cases, saying that "when I was [a U.S. Attorney], I signed 10 pleadings attacking segregation or the remnants of segregation, where we as part of the Department of Justice, we sought desegregation remedies."

Figures also said that Sessions had called him "boy." He also testified that "Mr. Sessions admonished me to 'be careful what you say to white folks.'"

Sessions responded to the testimony by denying the allegations, saying his remarks were taken out of context or meant in jest, and also stating that groups could be considered un-American when "they involve themselves in un-American positions" in foreign policy. Sessions said during testimony that he considered the Klan to be "a force for hatred and bigotry." In regards to the marijuana quote, Sessions said the comment was a joke but apologized.

In response to a question from Joe Biden on whether he had called the NAACP and other civil rights organizations "un-American", Sessions replied "I'm often loose with my tongue. I may have said something about the NAACP being un-American or Communist, but I meant no harm by it."

On June 5, 1986, the Committee voted 10-8 against recommending the nomination to the Senate floor, with Republican Senators Charles Mathias of Maryland and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania voting with the Democrats. It then split 9-9 on a vote to send Sessions' nomination to the Senate floor with no recommendation, with Specter again voting with the Democrats. The pivotal votes against Sessions came from Democratic Senator Howell Heflin of Alabama. Although Heflin had previously backed Sessions, he began to oppose Sessions after hearing testimony, concluding that there were "reasonable doubts" over Sessions' ability to be "fair and impartial." The nomination was withdrawn on July 31, 1986.

Sessions became only the second nominee to the federal judiciary in 48 years whose nomination was killed by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Sessions was quoted then as saying that the Senate on occasion had been insensitive to the rights and reputation of nominees.

One law clerk from the U.S. District Court in Mobile who had worked with Sessions later acknowledged the confirmation controversy, but stated that he observed Sessions as "a lawyer of the highest ethical and intellectual standards."

After joining the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sessions remarked that his presence there, alongside several of the members who voted against him, was a "great irony." When Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania left the GOP to join the Democratic Party on April 28, 2009, Sessions was selected to be the Ranking Member on the Senate Judiciary Committee. At that time, Specter said that his vote against Sessions' nomination was a mistake, because he had "since found that Sen. Sessions is egalitarian."

Alabama Attorney General and U.S. Senate
Sessions was elected Attorney General of Alabama in November 1994. In 1996, Sessions won the Republican primary for U.S. Senate, after a runoff, and then defeated Democrat Roger Bedford 53%-46% in the November general election. He succeeded Heflin, who had retired after 18 years in the Senate. In 2002, Sessions won reelection by defeating Democratic State Auditor Susan Parker. In 2008, Sessions defeated Democratic State Senator Vivian Davis Figures to win a third term. Sessions received 63 percent of the vote to Figures' 37 percent.

Sessions was only the second freshman Republican senator from Alabama since Reconstruction and gave Alabama two Republican senators, a first since Reconstruction. Sessions was easily reelected in 2002 becoming the first (or second, if one counts his colleague Richard Shelby, who switched from Democrat to Republican in 1994) Republican reelected to the Senate from Alabama.

Political positions
Sessions was ranked by National Journal as the fifth-most conservative U.S. Senator in their March 2007 Conservative/Liberal Rankings. He backs conservative Republican stances on foreign policy, taxes, and social issues. He opposes abortion and illegal immigration.

Sessions is the ranking Republican member on the Senate Budget Committee, a former ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and a senior member of the Armed Services Committee. He also serves on the Environment and Public Works Committee.

Sessions was a supporter of the "nuclear option," a tactic considered by then-Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist in the spring of 2005 to change longstanding Senate rules to stop Democratic filibusters of some of George W. Bush's nominees to the federal courts. When the "Gang of 14" group of moderate Senators reached an agreement to allow filibusters under "extraordinary circumstances," Sessions accepted the agreement but argued that "a return to the tradition of up-or-down votes on all judicial nominees would… strengthen the Senate."

Sessions is a signer of Americans for Tax Reform’s Taxpayer Protection Pledge.

Foreign and military policy
In 2005, Sessions spoke at a rally in Washington, D.C. in favor of the War in Iraq that was held in opposition to an anti-war protest held the day before. Sessions said of the anti-war protesters: "The group who spoke here the other day did not represent the American ideals of freedom, liberty and spreading that around the world. I frankly don't know what they represent, other than to blame America first."

In the 109th Congress, Sessions introduced legislation to increase the death gratuity benefit for families of servicemembers from $12,420 to $100,000. The bill also increased the level of coverage under the Servicemen's Group Life Insurance from $250,000 to $400,000. Sessions' legislation was accepted in the Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2005.

Crime and security
On October 5, 2005, he was one of nine Senators who voted against a Senate amendment to a House bill that prohibited cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment or punishment of individuals in the custody or under the physical control of the United States Government.

Sessions has taken a strong stand against any form of citizenship for illegal immigrants. Sessions was one of the most vocal critics of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2007. He is a supporter of E-Verify, the federal database that allows businesses to electronically verify the immigration status of potential new hires, and has advocated for expanded construction of a Southern border fence.

Sessions voted for the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act in committee, which would allow the Attorney General to ask a court to issue a restraining order Internet domain names that host copyright-infringing material.

Economic issues
Sessions voted for the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts, and said he would vote to make them permanent if given the chance.

In 2006, Sessions received the "Guardian of Small Business” award from the National Federation of Independent Business.

He voted for an amendment to the 2008 budget resolution, offered by Republican Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina, which would have placed a one-year moratorium on the practice of earmarking.

Sessions was one of 25 senators to vote against the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (the bank bailout), arguing that it "undermines our heritage of law and order, and is an affront to the principle of separation of powers."

Sessions opposed the $837 billion stimulus bill, calling it "the largest spending bill in the history of the republic." He also expressed skepticism about the $447 billion jobs bill recently proposed by President Obama, and disputed the notion that the bill would be paid for and not add to the national debt.

Gay rights
Sessions has been an opponent of same-sex marriage and has earned a zero rating from the Human Rights Campaign, the United States' largest LGBT Advocacy group, for the 108th, 109th, and 110th Congress. He voted against the Matthew Shepard Act, which added acts of bias-motivated violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity to federal hate-crimes law, and a congressional resolution calling on members of the Ugandan Parliament to reject the proposed "Kill-the-Gays Bill."

Sessions voted in favor of advancing the Federal Marriage Amendment in 2004 and 2006.

His website states that he believes that "a marriage is union between a man and women." On December 18, 2010, Sessions voted against the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010.

Sessions has also said regarding the appointment of a gay Supreme Court justice, "I do not think that a person who acknowledges that they have gay tendencies is disqualified, per se, for the job" but that "it would be a big concern that the American people might feel uneasy about."

Health care reform
Sessions opposed President Barack Obama's health reform legislation; he voted against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in December 2009, and he voted against the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010.

Energy policy
Sessions is a proponent of nuclear power, and has voted to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.

Supreme Court nominations
While serving as the ranking member on the Judiciary Committee in the 110th Congress, Sessions was the senior Republican who questioned Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Barack Obama's nominee to succeed retiring Justice David Souter. Sessions focused on Sotomayor's views on empathy as a quality for a judge, arguing that "empathy for one party is always prejudice against another." Sessions also questioned the nominee about her views on the use of foreign law in deciding cases, as well as her role in the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund (PRLDEF).

On July 28, 2009, Sessions joined five Republican colleagues in voting against Sotomayor's nomination in the Judiciary Committee. The committee approved Sotomayor by a vote of 13-6. Sessions also voted against Sotomayor when her nomination came before the full Senate. He was one of 31 senators (all Republicans) to do so, while 68 voted to confirm the nominee.

Sessions also served as the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee during the nomination process for Elena Kagan, President Obama’s nominee to succeed retired Justice John Paul Stevens. Sessions based his opposition on the nominee’s lack of experience, her background as a political operative (Kagan had said that she worked in the Clinton White House not as a lawyer but as a policy adviser), and her record on guns,abortion, and gay rights. Sessions pointed out that Kagan “has a very thin record legally, never tried a case, never argued before a jury, only had her first appearance in the appellate courts a year ago."

Sessions focused the majority of his criticism on Kagan’s treatment of the military while she was dean of Harvard Law School. During her tenure, Kagan reinstated the practice of requiring military recruiters to coordinate their activities through a campus veterans organization, rather than the school’s Office of Career Services. Kagan argued that she was trying to comply with a law known as the Solomon Amendment, which barred federal funds from any college or university that did not grant military recruiters equal access to campus facilities. Sessions asserted that Kagan’s action was a violation of the Solomon Amendment and that it amounted to “demeaning and punishing the military. He also argued that her action showed a willingness to place her politics above the law.

On July 20, 2010, Sessions and five Republican colleagues voted against Kagan’s nomination. Despite this, the Judiciary Committee approved the nomination by a 13-6 vote. Sessions also voted against Kagan in the full Senate vote, joining 36 other senators (including one Democrat) in opposition. 63 senators voted to confirm Kagan. Following the vote, Sessions remarked on future nominations and elections, saying that Americans would "not forgive the Senate if we further expose our Constitution to revision and rewrite by judicial fiat to advance what President Obama says is a broader vision of what America should be."

Abortion
Sessions is pro-life and was one of 37 Senators to vote against funding for embryonic stem cell research.

Political contributions
During his career, his largest donors have come from the legal, health, real estate and insurance industries. From 2005 to 2010, the corporations employing donors who gave the most to his campaign were the Southern Company utility firm, Balch & Bingham law firm, Harbert Management investment firm, Drummond Company coal mining firm, and WPP Group, a UK-based communications services company.

Committee assignments
* Committee on Armed Services
o Subcommittee on Airland
o Subcommittee on Seapower
o Subcommittee on Strategic Forces
* Committee on the Budget (ranking member)
* United States Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works
* Committee on the Judiciary
o Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts (Ranking Member)
o Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs
o Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Refugees
o Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology, and Homeland Security
* International Narcotics Control Caucus

Politics & Geography - Alabama: Senator Richard Shelby [R]

From Wikipedia:
Richard Craig Shelby (born May 6, 1934) is the senior United States Senator from Alabama. First elected to the Senate in 1986, he is the ranking member of the United States Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs and was its chairman from 2003 to 2007.

Born in Birmingham, Alabama, Shelby received his law degree from the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, where he went on to serve as city prosecutor (1963–1971). During this period he worked as a U.S. Magistrate for the Northern District of Alabama (1966–1970) and Special Assistant Attorney General of Alabama (1969–1971). He won a seat in the Alabama Senate in 1970. In 1978 he was elected to the United States House of Representatives from the 7th District, where he was among a group of conservative Democrats known as the boll weevils. Shelby won a tight race in 1986 for the U.S. Senate. Originally elected as a Democrat, Shelby switched to the Republican Party in 1994 when Republicans gained the majority in Congress midway through President Bill Clinton's first term. He was re-elected by a large margin in 1998 and has faced no electoral opposition since.

Early life, education, and early career
Shelby was born in Birmingham, Alabama, the son of Alice L. (née Skinner) and Ozie Houston Shelby. He attended the University of Alabama, receiving an undergraduate degree in 1957 and a Juris Doctor in 1963.

Shelby is a member of the American Bar Association and Alabama State Bar, as well as the American Judicature Society, Alabama Law Institute, Delta Chi Fraternity, and Phi Alpha Delta legal fraternity.

Shelby was a city prosecutor in Tuscaloosa, Alabama from 1963 to 1971. From 1966 to 1970, he was a U.S. Magistrate for the Northern District of Alabama; from 1969 to 1971, Shelby was a Special Assistant State Attorney General.

Alabama Senate
Elections
Shelby began his legislative career as a member of the Alabama Senate in 1970, serving until 1978, when he was elected to the House of Representatives from the Tuscaloosa-based 7th District. He was re-elected three times.

Tenure
He was one of the more conservative Democrats in Congress, and a member of the boll weevils, a group of moderate to conservative leaning Democrats who often worked with Republican President Ronald Reagan on defense issues.

U.S. Senate
Elections
In 1986, Shelby won the Democratic nomination for the Senate seat held by Republican Jeremiah Denton, the first Republican elected to the Senate from Alabama since Reconstruction. He won a very close race as the Democrats regained control of the Senate. He was easily re-elected in 1992 even as Bill Clinton lost Alabama's electoral votes.

On November 9, 1994, Shelby switched his party affiliation to Republican, one day after the Republicans won control of both houses in the midterm elections, giving the Republicans a 53-47 majority in the Senate. He won his first full term as a Republican in 1998 by a large margin, and faced no significant opposition in 2004 or 2010.

Shelby remains popular in Alabama. A September 2009 poll showed he had a 58% approval rating, with 35% disapproving.

Tenure
1980s
In 1987, Shelby opposed Reagan's nomination of Robert Bork to the Supreme Court; a move attributed to lobbying by Alabama African-American leaders who reminded Shelby that he had relied on support from African-American voters in defeating Denton in 1986.

1990s
Shelby publicly feuded with Bill Clinton during the first half of Clinton's first term. At a meeting with Vice President Al Gore, he turned to 19 Alabama TV cameras and denounced the Clinton program as "high on taxes, low on spending cuts".

Shelby served on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence from 1995 to 2003, stepping down because of a Senate rule limiting committee terms to eight years. Shelby took an adversarial stance towards the intelligence community during both Clinton and Bush administrations. He helped sink Anthony Lake's nomination as CIA director in 1997 and promised to investigate the use of American-made satellites by the Chinese to gather intelligence. Shelby also took a hard line on leaks of classified information. In 2000. he introduced a bill (vetoed by President Clinton) "that would have broadened the law that criminalizes release of "national defense information." According to the Washington Post:

"Civil liberties groups and news organizations, which argued that the legislation would chill their ability to get information from officials, lobbied for the veto. . . . In 2002, with George W. Bush in the White House, Shelby reintroduced his language, but then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft said that "rigorous investigation" and enforcement of existing laws -- not new legislation -- were the best way to fight leaks.

Senator Shelby has supported several gun control measures put forth by Democrats including the 1991 Crime Bill S.1241 sponsored by then Senator Joseph Biden that instituted a national waiting period for handgun purchases as well as a federal ban on semi-automatic firearms. In 1998, Shelby voted for Senator Barbara Boxer's Trigger Lock Amendment 3230, requiring the purchase of a trigger lock with the sale of each handgun. Firearms dealers who do not comply are guilty of a federal crime and face revocation of their Federal Firearms License and civil fines up to $10,000 for each omission.

2000s
Shelby was also highly critical of CIA Director George Tenet in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. When Tenet resigned in July 2004, Shelby commented "This is not a surprise to me at all. What was a surprise was that he held onto the job as long as he did."

From 2003 until 2007, he chaired the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs. He is also a member of the Appropriations Committee (where he chaired its subcommittee on Commerce, Justice and Science) and Special Committee on Aging. He lost his chairmanships in 2007 when the Democrats regained control of the Senate.

In 2004, a federal investigation concluded that Shelby revealed classified information to the media when he was a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Specifically, Shelby revealed classified information on June 19, 2002 to Carl Cameron, the chief political correspondent on Fox News. The information consisted of two messages intercepted by the National Security Agency on September 10, 2001, but were only translated the day after the attacks — "the match is about to begin" and "tomorrow is zero hour." The Department of Justice declined to file criminal charges against Shelby and transferred the case to the Senate Ethics Committee, which dismissed its probe into the alleged leak.

Shelby, in his role as chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, & Urban Affairs, opposed proposed legislation that would have permitted additional competition in the title insurance industry.

Shelby is currently co-chair of the Congressional Privacy Caucus and Zero Capital Gains Tax Caucus. He is also the Senate co-chair of the National Security Caucus. In addition, he is a member of the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the Senate Centrist Coalition.

In the Metroplex of Dallas–Fort Worth, Shelby is known for the Shelby Amendment, a law he sponsored that eased some of the restrictions placed on Dallas' secondary airport by the contentious Wright Amendment.

On February 5, 2010, Shelby placed a hold on over 70 of Obama's nominees to various government posts, in a protest over an Air Force KC-135 Stratotanker contract and the FBI's Terrorist Explosive Device Analytical Center. Shelby lifted all but three of the holds on February 8, 2010, releasing a statement that "The purpose of placing numerous holds was to get the White House’s attention on two issues that are critical to our national security – the Air Force’s aerial refueling tanker acquisition and the FBI’s Terrorist Device Analytical Center (TEDAC).

With that accomplished, Sen. Shelby has decided to release his holds on all but a few nominees directly related to the Air Force tanker acquisition until the new Request for Proposal is issued." White House spokesman Robert Gibbs criticized Shelby for "hold[ing] up qualified nominees for positions that are needed because he didn't get two earmarks"; Shelby denied the holds were over earmarks.

Shelby criticised the Obama administration for abandoning NASA's Constellation program stating "It is unfortunate that this administration is choosing to abandon our nation's only chance at remaining the leader in human space flight. It is ironic that Constellation, a program born out of the recommendations of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, would be eliminated in lieu of rockets repeatedly deemed unsafe for astronauts by NASA's own Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel. If this budget is enacted, NASA will no longer be an agency of innovation and hard science; it will be the agency of pipe dreams and fairy tales." Shelby failed to cite any evidence that the untested Ares rockets, being developed under the Constellation program, would be any safer than existing rockets.

Critics point out that Shelby supports big government programs but ignores the private sector at every opportunity. Although he called Constellation "our nation's only chance at remaining the leader in human space flight," a number of private companies were, and are, competing to develop orbital launch systems. Among these companies is United Launch Alliance, a Boeing-Lockheed joint venture that builds rockets in Shelby's home state. Numerous other companies are developing reusable suborbital launch vehicles, which could evolve into orbital systems. Unlike Constellation, these reusable vehicles offer the promise of significant cost and safety improvements. Critics worry that Shelby's support of an expensive expendable rocket will lock NASA into using expendable technologies for another several decades, thereby jeopardizing astronaut safety.

Political views
With a reputation as a moderate Republican, Shelby has taken conservative stances on taxation, abortion and immigration, while siding with the Democratic stance on other issues, such as opposing free-trade agreements and voting against the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act. During the 1990s he was a strong opponent of the Clinton administration's spending and tax policies, while supporting some gun control measures. He served on the Select Committee on Intelligence, where he battled CIA leaders and attempted to curtail the release of information to the public. A federal investigation uncovered that he had released classified memos to the Fox News Channel in 2002, but no charges were pressed.

He chaired the Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee from 2003 to 2007 and remains the committee's Republican ranking member. During President Barack Obama's administration he placed a hold on 70 government nominees to draw attention to certain national security issues. He has opposed the bulk of the Democratic legislative agenda since they took control of the Senate in 2007, including economic bailout measures and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Shelby first opposed, then ignored the Republican Party moratorium on earmark funding. He is a leading backer of the Space Launch System, more commonly known as the Senate Launch System, an expensive, Congressionally mandated rocket that would increase the cost of space transportation but benefit NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, located in Shelby's home state.

Shelby has disagreed with other Senators over details design of the SLS, however. Other Senators, include Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, want an SLS design that uses solid-rocket motors manufactured by ATK (Alliant Techsystems)for its strap-on boosters. Shelby favors competition for the strap-on booster design. Neither favors competition for core elements of the rocket, however.

The SLS earmark has been opposed by fiscal conservative groups, including the Tea Party, as well as space-exploration advocacy groups. Congressman Tom McClintock (R-CA) has expressed "serious concerns with NASA's attempt to avoid holding a full and open competition to acquire the SLS." Rep. McClintock "stringly believe[s] that such a de facto sole source award would be a violation of the 1984 Competition in Contracting Act." Rep. McClintock has asked the Government Accountability Office to investigate the SLS earmark.

Because of its high cost, the SLS is the single largest earmark in the Federal budget and possibly the single large earmark in US history.

Shelby took a leading role in the resistance to bailing out the banks and other corporations (such as AIG), both under the Bush Administration, in 2008, and the Obama Administration, beginning in 2009.

Senator Shelby has also supported several key gun control measures put forth by Democrats, including the 1991 Crime Bill S.1241 sponsored by then Senator Joseph Biden that instituted a national waiting period for handgun purchases as well as a federal ban on semi-automatic firearms.

In 1998, Shelby voted for Senator Barbara Boxer's Trigger Lock Amendment 3230, a law requiring the purchase of a trigger lock with the sale of each handgun. Firearms dealers who do not comply with the law are guilty of a federal crime and face revocation of their Federal Firearms License and civil fines up to $10,000 for each omission.

He is against abortion, and supports the Federal Marriage Amendment. He has also been a staunch advocate of a flat tax and of the Bush Administration's tax cuts. He cites disagreements with the Democrats on tax policy as one of the main reasons he became a Republican; he feels the Democrats are too willing to enact tax increases. Among the bills sponsored by Shelby over the years have been bills to make English the sole language of the federal government, to limit federal government spending by statute, and to provide a moratorium on certain forms of immigration.

Shelby is considered to be much more independent-minded than his Senate colleague from Alabama, Jeff Sessions.[citation needed] For instance, shortly after becoming a Republican he voted against two major tort reform bills, the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act and the Common Sense Product Liability and Legal Reform Act. Both bills were vetoed by President Clinton, though the first bill was successfully passed over his veto. In 1999 he was the only Senate Republican to vote against the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. Shelby also voted against the North American Free Trade Agreement and opposes most free trade agreements, most recently the Central America Free Trade Agreement. When he was a Democrat, Shelby opposed the confirmation of Robert Bork to the United States Supreme Court in 1987. He supported the confirmation of John Roberts and Samuel Alito almost two decades later.

Other Republicans have criticized the SLS earmark, which has even become an issue in the Presidential primary. At a town meeting hosted by the Dallas Tea Party, Presidential Candidate and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich criticized politicians supporting the Space Launch System, "I think it is disgraceful the way getting into space has been turned into a political pork-barrel. It’s an abuse of the taxpayer and an abuse of America’s future.”

In 1999, Shelby was one of ten Republican senators to vote for the acquittal of President Bill Clinton on the charge of perjury when Clinton was tried in the Senate in 1999, although he voted for Clinton's conviction on the charge of obstruction of justice.

Shelby opposed the initial bailout proposal to extend billions of dollars in loan money to the Big Three US Auto Manufacturers. He is often seen as a front man for the GOP Senate opposition. In late 2008, he opposed a Federal government bridge loan for US-owned auto companies, saying: "We don't need government - governmental subsidies for manufacturing in this country. It's the French model, it's the wrong road. We will pay for it. The average American taxpayer is going to pay dearly for this, if I'm not wrong." Shelby's opposition to manufacturing subsidies does not extend to his own state, however, especially the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville. When it comes to aerospace, Shelby ridicules private enterprise as a "faith-based initiative" and supports a national monopoly space transportation system owned and operated by the Federal government.

Sen. Richard Shelby voted to block three amendments to regulate banks, including an amendment #3812 to S. 3217,to cap ATM fees at $0.50 per transaction, and also to bar banks who borrowed tax payer money through TARP funds to use those funds for their own benefit. Sen. Shelby also believes that bank oversight violates the right to privacy and is against the Government Office of Financial Research being able to collect any financial data it needs to regulate the bank industry.

Shelby opposed President Barack Obama's health reform legislation; he voted against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in December 2009, and he voted against the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010.

Shelby opposed the nomination of Nobel Economics Prize laureate and Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Peter Diamond to serve on the board of the Federal Reserve, on the grounds that professor Diamond "lacked the necessary qualifications".

Shelby is a signer of Americans for Tax Reform’s Taxpayer Protection Pledge.