About
John “Judge” Carter (R-Texas) has represented central Texas’ 31st Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives since 2003. In 2022, after easily winning the GOP primary, he ran unopposed for his 11th term in Congress. A former lawyer, he picked up his nickname when he served as a judge for the 277th District Court in Williamson County, Texas from 1981–2002.
With the voting record of “a fanatical Republican extremist,” as the Daily Kos puts it, Carter is a vocal denier of climate change, calling it a “chicken-little scheme to use mass media and government propaganda to convince the world that destruction of individual liberties and national sovereignty is necessary to save mankind, and that the unwashed masses would destroy themselves without the enlightened global dictatorship of these frauds.” Unsurprisingly, his staunch anti-environmental voting record has earned him a 4% lifetime rating from the League of Conservation Voters.
After the 2020 presidential election, Carter showed strong loyalty to Trump by helping to spread the Big Lie and casting doubt on the legitimacy of Biden’s victory. He objected to certifying the Electoral College results and voted against both impeaching Trump for inciting the mob and establishing a special House committee to investigate the insurrection, among other measures.
Carter also voted against the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2021 (and against the For the People Act five months earlier), calling it “a power grab for the Democrats” that “takes Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars and uses them to fund politicians’ personal campaigns.”
January 6, 2021
- Just hours after Trump supporters stormed the Capitol, Carter joined 146 other congressional Republicans in refusing to certify Biden’s win of the 2020 presidential election.
- When voting against impeaching Trump for his role in instigating the attack on Congress and for fanning the flames once the riot broke out, Carter released a statement explaining that while he could not “condemn the actions of those who perpetrated this act of domestic terrorism enough,” he felt that impeachment “will only further deepen the divisions and derail any efforts to unite the country….”
- In a separate statement, he objected to H.R. 21, which called on Vice President Pence to declare Trump incapable of performing his duties under the 25th Amendment. Carter argued that the Constitution grants the power to initiate the process to the VP, not the legislative branch, and that the bill in question was “designed” to pressure Pence into doing “what the House majority” wanted.
- Carter voted against establishing a House committee to investigate what led to the violent disruption of the congressional session underway that day.
- In May 2021, Carter was one of only two House members who failed to vote on a bill to improve security at the Capitol.
The Big Lie
- When refusing to certify the 2020 Electoral College results, Carter claims he was standing up for “the 74 million people who feel like they cannot trust their democracy,” along with “thousands of my constituents that feel like their vote didn’t count, and feel like allegations of election irregularities were not sufficiently investigated.”
Top contributors for the 2024 election cycle.
The organizations themselves did not donate, rather the money came from the organization's PAC, its individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals' immediate families.
| Organization Name | Total | PACs | Individuals |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scientific Research Corp | $27,000.00 | $0.00 | $27,000.00 |
| Ametrine Inc | $24,800.00 | $0.00 | $24,800.00 |
| Trideum Corp | $24,800.00 | $0.00 | $24,800.00 |
| Trident Research | $23,900.00 | $0.00 | $23,900.00 |
| American Israel Public Affairs Cmte | $15,250.00 | $5,000.00 | $10,250.00 |
| Sparkcognition | $12,700.00 | $0.00 | $12,700.00 |
| JA Green & Co | $11,600.00 | $0.00 | $11,600.00 |
| Ultra Electronics Prologic | $11,000.00 | $0.00 | $11,000.00 |
| Atlantic Strategies Group | $10,200.00 | $0.00 | $10,200.00 |
| BAE Systems | $10,000.00 | $10,000.00 | $0.00 |