Rep. Don Bacon voted twice against bill aimed at ensuring equal pay for women

By Kevin O’Hanlon and Josh Israel

Nebraska Republican U.S. Rep. Don Bacon is running for reelection claiming to be a political centrist who effectively gets results in a bipartisan manner. During his seven years in Congress, however, he repeatedly voted against legislation aimed at ensuring equal pay for men and women doing the same work.

Bacon, who represents the 2nd Congressional District, is facing a challenge from Democratic state Sen.Tony Vargas, who has made women’s rights and livable wages central issues in his campaign.

“From voting against equal pay protections for women to pushing for a national abortion ban with no exceptions for rape, incest, or the mother’s life, Don Bacon’s anti-woman agenda is simply cruel, dangerous, and out of touch,” Vargas said is a statement to the Nebraska Independent. “I’m proud of my record of improving maternal health, protecting reproductive freedom, and supporting young mothers as they finish school. In Congress, I’ll build on this record and ensure Nebraska women finally have an advocate in Washington.”

Women who work full time in the United States were on average paid about 17% less than their male counterparts in 2021, according to data from the U.S. Department of Labor, despite a 1963 law that prohibits sex-based wage discrimination.

In Nebraska, the annual wage gap between men and women is nearly $14,000 — enough to pay for eight months of health insurance, 14 months of rent, or 1.1 years of child care — according to the National Partnership for Women & Families.

Bacon has represented Nebraska’s 2nd District since 2017. During his tenure, the House has twice considered a bill aimed at closing this gap.

The Paycheck Fairness Act, which has repeatedly passed in the House but stalled in the Senate, would make it easier to hold employers accountable for pay discrimination by expanding legal remedies for victims, protecting the right of workers to discuss their salaries with each other, and establishing a federal task force to help enforce the law.

Bacon voted against the bill twice, in 2019 and 2021.

In an April 2021 press release, Bacon criticized the bill and backed a weaker Republican alternative, the Wage Equity Act, which would encourage voluntary efforts by businesses to address the pay gap and authorize a government study of the problem. “Equal work deserves equal pay. Addressing pay discrimination in the workplace must be a priority. H.R. 7, the so-called ‘Paycheck Fairness Act’ introduced by my Democrat colleagues, offers no new protections, threatens workers’ privacy, and drags hardworking women through never-ending legal proceedings and lawsuits,” Bacon said at the time.

Gloria Vallecillo of Omaha, a 49-year-old mother of four who begins work this summer as a paraeducator, said she has had jobs at which she suspected women were being paid less than men but could not prove it.

“I think that sometimes, yeah, it probably did happen,” she told the Nebraska Independent. “It’s really hard to prove it, because what they do is, they’ll just categorize it as, Oh, well, it’s because they either have more education, or because they applied for a job or something like that, that’s a higher pay.”

Bacon “should vote for us as women to be equals in regards to pay,” Vallecillo added.”We work as much, even more, sometimes, than a man at the [same] job. So we should get compensated for it.”

Angie Lauritsen, the state director at Nebraska For Us, a grassroots economic educational and advocacy program that represents working-class and middle-income Nebraskans, agreed.

“Members of Congress — including Congressman Don Bacon — should support laws that address challenges facing workers across the board like the gender pay gap,” Lauritsen said in an emailed statement. “According to Pew Research, that disparity has remained largely unchanged over the past two decades which is purely unacceptable. If lawmakers refuse to act, then who will?”

This is not the only time Bacon voted against workers’ and women’s rights.

In 2019, he voted against the Raise the Wage Act, which would have established a $15 federal minimum hourly wage.

In 2022, he voted against both the Women’s Health Protection Act, which would have restored the right to an abortion previously affirmed in Roe v. Wade, and the Right to Contraception Act to guarantee access to contraceptives.

Bacon’s office did not respond to several requests for comment for this story.