Rep. Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH)

Rep. Carol Shea-Porter is a progressive Democrat representing the First District of New Hampshire. She was known as an outspoken opponent of the Iraq War and won her seat in 2006 at the expense of her better-funded Republican opponent, who was the incumbent at the time. Since holding office, she has been re-elected in 2008 and has built up a fairly progressive record on social issues. She focuses most of her efforts on education, equal opportunity for women, health care, and supporting members of the military and veterans.

She has yet to take a definitive stance on immigration reform or the DREAM Act and has not had the opportunity to vote on an immigration bill yet. She has also not sponsored or co-sponsored any legislation dealing with immigration or border security. Furthermore, her website contains no information about her stance on the issue of immigration. Given her progressive record on other social issues, one might reasonably expect she would vote for immigration reform or the DREAM Act if either measure came to a vote in Congress. Her position will remain unclear, however, until she takes a definitive stance one way or the other, or has to vote on an immigration bill.

There is, however, some reason to expect that she would vote for the DREAM Act as a stand-alone bill. She is known to be a champion of education and particularly of opening up opportunity to a higher education for groups that are traditionally underrepresented in academia. Examples of bills she has co-sponsored dealing with higher education are numerous in her short career. Rep. Shea-Porter co-sponsored two bills in 2007 that would have reduced interest rates for student loans and placed stricter rules on lenders (H.R. 5) and (H.R. 890). In 2007, she also co-sponsored a measure that aimed to provide post-9/11 veterans financial aid to pursue their goals in higher education (H.R. 2702). She signed on to a 2007 bill that extended a measure that made employer-based educational aid permanently excluded from an employee's taxable gross income (H.R. 3418). Finally, she has co-sponsored the 2009 "Pathway to College" Act in the current session of congress, which aims to provide five-year funding grants to local agencies to provide students from "high-need" high schools and low-income families with assistance in obtaining a college degree (H.R. 2579).

Given her stance on opening up opportunities to higher education, Rep. Shea-Porter would be a good target to lobby for co-sponsorship of the DREAM Act. As far as comprehensive immigration reform goes, this candidate is very neutral about committing herself one way or the other. Until we can get some kind of confirmation from her office about her stance on CIR, there is really no telling how she would vote on an immigration bill.