Partisanship in Congressional Travels abroad

Abstract

Members of Congress frequently cite official travels abroad as one of the best opportunities to develop friendships across the aisle. Yet since 1977, representatives spent roughly one of every eight days with members of only their political party. Some members have spent more than a month's worth of time in a single congress traveling and never doing so with a member from the other party. This paper examines the causes and consequences of the members who are willing to travel overseas so long as it is not with a member of the other party. We find that liberal Democrat are more likely than moderate Democrat to travel with their copartisans, and moderate Democrat are more likely than liberals to travel abroad in cross-party delegations. For Republicans, the former relationship holds, though we uncover no relationship for the latter. Taken together, these results suggest that ideological extremism and partisan warfare are tearing at the norms surrounding congressional travel abroad, which is perhaps the last and best opportunity for members to form relationships across the aisle.