A year of expanding job opportunities, protecting consumers, delivering for veterans, and strengthening accountability across the federal government

• Launched an investigation into weight-loss diet scams harming American consumers—collecting tips and stories from Missourians about their personal experiences with such deceptive practices, and ultimately leading a Senate hearing to question popular TV host Dr. Mehmet Oz on his frequent claims about “miracle” products, explore options for regulators and industry to crack down on the scams, and urge media outlets to strengthen screening of false advertising

• Successfully called for the removal of Lieutenant General Craig Franklin from the U.S. Air Force in response to Franklin’s handling of a sexual assault case at Aviano Air Base in Italy

• Invited U.S. Army Chief of Staff General Ray Odierno to visit Fort Leonard Wood, Mo.—where he met directly with community members, visited the Special Victims training unit with the military police, held a meeting on integration of women into combat roles, and reviewed other missions that make Fort Leonard Wood a critical installation for the nation’s defense

• Successfully passed into law a comprehensive plan fixing the Pentagon’s troubled program to recover American personnel who are prisoners of war and missing in action, establishing a single agency with one federal official in charge—following her previous year’s investigation into systemic problems with POW-MIA recovery efforts

• Met directly with Major General Margaret Woodward, and Brigadier General Gina Grosso, who both headed the Air Force Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office—and with Major General Jeffrey Snow, the new director of the Department of Defense Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office—to push for continued efforts to curb sexual assaults in the U.S. military, following the previous year’s passage of historic, sweeping reforms to how the military justice system handles such crimes

• Successfully passed into law a bipartisan bill boosting oversight in how the government conducts background checks for security clearances, cosponsored by Senator Jon Tester of Montana and Republican Senators Rob Portman of Ohio and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, by empowering the Office of Personnel Management’s Office of Inspector General to audit and investigate contractors that conduct background checks—and gained Senate approval of legislation to terminate or place on leave any employee that is involved in intentional misconduct affecting the integrity of background investigations

• Led a successful effort to retain two federal weather centers in Kansas City, and the jobs they support

• Moved to protect military veterans after reports that lawyers and financial advisors accredited by the Department of Veterans Affairs to provide veterans with counseling had abused their positions, provided negligent representation of veterans, and reaped millions of taxpayer dollars in the process

• Following a two-year-long fight, helped win successful passage of a bipartisan Farm Bill renewal, after repeated rejections by U.S. House Republicans

• Called on the nation’s top consumer protection agency to investigate a spike in propane prices for Missouri families, and joined with fellow Missouri Senator Roy Blunt to demand President Obama facilitate regulatory relief to increase propane supply in areas with critical shortages

• Met with Philomena Lee to discuss Irish adoption laws and Philomena’s work to reunite American children separated from their Irish families through forced adoption—after the story of Philomena’s decades-long search for the son who was forcibly adopted and raised by a family in St. Louis, Mo., was the subject of a book and Oscar-nominated film

• Led an investigation and chaired two Senate hearings revealing one of the biggest fraud investigations in U.S. Army history—including up to $100 million in waste—identifying pervasive fraud and waste in the Army National Guard’s Recruiting Assistance Program, which paid National Guard members, retirees, and civilians to recruit friends and family, but had virtually no safeguards or controls, and ultimately led to indictments against five current and former Army National Guard officials on charges of bribery

• Successfully passed into law legislation requiring TRICARE—health insurance provided to members of the military and their families—to cover breastfeeding equipment, like breast pumps, along with support and counseling, as required by most health plans under the Affordable Care Act

• Continued fight to protect rural post offices and postal service—winning approval from the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee for proposals to increase protections for post offices and postal delivery standards, and joining with fellow Missouri Senator Roy Blunt and several Senate colleagues to demand a delay in the planned consolidation of up to 82 mail processing facilities after the agency’s Inspector General found the Postal Service failed to fulfil its obligations to adequately study the impact of the consolidations, and failed to inform the public of those impacts

• Was once again ranked exactly in the moderate middle of the U.S. Senate, ranking #50 out of 100 by the nonpartisan news magazine National Journal in its annual rankings of members of Congress from liberal-to-conservative

• Introduced legislation to better equip the nation's top consumer protection agency with the tools needed to better protect jobs and businesses by cracking down on “patent trolls”—companies that buy patents, but then fail to actually produce goods or services, opting instead to intimidate or sue other small businesses

• Held top military leaders to account for a report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, citing ambiguous benchmarks for progress, unrealistic goals, flawed implementation of programs, and lack of performance oversight, putting at risk hundreds of millions of American taxpayer dollars

• Successfully pushed the European Union to reverse its efforts to impose a carbon charge on American air carriers operating flights in and out of Europe, coming more than one year after teaming up with Republican Senator John Thune of South Dakota to pass into law a resolution rejecting the EU’s illegal carbon tax on U.S. air travelers

• Won passage into law of additional measures further strengthening already historic reforms to curb sexual assaults in the U.S. military—after leading the successful effort in 2013 to overhaul how the military handles such crimes, better protecting and empowering survivors, boosting prosecutions of predators, and holding military commanders accountable

• Hosted a public roundtable discussion to hear from whistleblowers who were fired after raising safety concerns at the Hanford nuclear site in Washington state, and led a formal hearing to highlight the issue of whistleblower retaliation

• Was inducted into the Army Women’s Foundation’s Hall of Fame for distinguished service to the United States and exceptional contributions to women in the military service

• Traveled to every corner of Missouri on the “McCaskill on Main Street” tour, bringing her to public town halls, meetings with local leaders, and events, all focused on policies to boost job and business opportunities

• Led the effort in Congress to address sexual assault on college and university campuses—meeting directly with federal experts, launching an unprecedented national survey of colleges and universities, hosting a series of public Senate roundtable discussions with stakeholders from across the country, crafting and introducing bipartisan legislation to boost safety on campuses, and hearing directly from nearly 50 Missouri colleges and universities on a tour across the state to gather feedback and build support for needed changes

• Used her Senate Consumer Protection panel to lead the investigations and chair several Senate hearings holding General Motors and safety regulators to account for its recalls of nearly 2.6 million vehicles for defective ignition switches that were linked to at least 13 deaths, including a fatality in Missouri—and ultimately introducing legislation aimed at keeping American travelers safe on the road and holding accountable companies who ignore or violate safety laws

• Teamed up with Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma to introduce the Let Me Google That For You Act, a bipartisan, bicameral bill to eliminate an outdated federal agency that has lost more than $1 million trying to sell government reports that are available for free online—and later led a Senate hearing shining a spotlight on the agency

• Continued longstanding support for construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline, citing potential for job opportunities and stronger energy security, voting to approve the project and calling on the President to implement a specific timeline for its construction

• Announced additional disaster relief for Joplin, Mo. hospitals to aid in rebuilding efforts from the devastating tornado in May 2011—championing federal tornado recovery in Joplin that now exceeds $350 million

• Joined with Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire to introduce bipartisan legislation that would prohibit bonuses for federal employees who aren't in good standing with their agency or the law—and later, bipartisan legislation that would take back bonuses paid to employees at the VA who were involved in the manipulation of electronic waitlists

• On the 130th anniversary of the birth of Missouri native and former U.S. President Harry S. Truman, teamed up with fellow Missouri Senator Roy Blunt to introduce bipartisan legislation that would rename Washington, D.C.’s iconic Union Station the “Harry S. Truman Union Station.”

• Joined with Senators Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia and Cory Booker of New Jersey—fellow members of the Senate Commerce Committee—to call on the NCAA to exercise better oversight of its member institutions to ensure that they are taking the necessary steps to protect student-athletes from exploitation

• Successfully pressured the White House to implement a fast-tracking plan for new infrastructure, development, and energy projects—modeled in part on her bipartisan legislation with Senators Rob Portman of Ohio and Joe Donnelly of Indiana

• Introduced legislation along with Senator Mark Udall of Colorado aimed at ensuring women serving in the military have 12 weeks of maternity leave, instead of the six weeks they may currently receive, aligning the military's family policies with the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) guidelines available to federal employees

• Teamed up with Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma to introduce the Orphan Earmarks Act, to eliminate unused earmarks within the Department of Transportation and void earmarks of funds provided by DOT that have 90 percent or more remaining after 10 fiscal years

• Hosted a hands-on workshop aimed at expanding Missouri job opportunities by connecting small businesses with resources and experts in government purchasing practices and doing business with the local, state and federal government—and featuring Secretary of the U.S. Air Force Deborah Lee James, who oversees the Air Force's annual budget of more than $110 billion

• Successfully nominated dozens of Missouri students from across the state to U.S. military service academies

• Cosponsored a sweeping bill to allow individuals to refinance their student loan debt at lower interest rates, helping address the record high levels of crippling loan debt and delinquencies increasingly affecting millions of students and their families

• As Chairman of the Senate Consumer Protection panel, crafted a measure aimed at bringing transparency and fairness to cable, satellite, and other pay-TV billing practices—starting by soliciting personal stories and tips from Missouri consumers

• Helped secure bipartisan Senate renewal of the Workforce Investment Act, expired legislation that has a proven track-record of boosting job opportunities for Missourians

• Introduced legislation that would require the firing of any Veterans Affairs employee found to have retaliated against a whistleblower                                                                              

• In what she called the correction of the Senate’s “grievous error,” successfully rallied support for the confirmation of Missouri judge Ronnie White—whose earlier nomination was defeated in a controversial vote in 1999 —to the federal bench

• Introduced legislation to better equip federal regulators to crack down on fraudulent robocalls, which are continually ranked among the top consumer complaints at the Federal Trade Commission, Federal Communications Commission, and the Missouri Attorney General’s office

• Joined with fellow Missouri Senator Roy Blunt to introduce bipartisan legislation to improve power grid reliability while protecting utilities from conflicting environmental statutes

• Following the shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., helped secure a commitment from the U.S. Justice Department for an independent investigation, led a Senate hearing examining a lack of coordination and oversight in programs supporting local law enforcement, and began crafting legislation aimed in part at expanding the use of body cameras by law enforcement to protect both police officers and civilians

• Expanded her Missouri veterans secret shopper program to the southeast Missouri region in visits to John J. Pershing Medical Center and the VA’s West Plains Community-Based Outpatient Clinic—a program now active in four regions: St. Louis, Kansas City, Columbia, and Poplar Bluff

• Secured long-overdue Purple Heart awards for St. Peters, Mo. Vietnam veteran Patrick Howe—and for St. Louis Korean War veteran Reverend Leo Hardin

• Voted to support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to restore reasonable limits on money in politics

• Announced the approval of millions of dollars in competitive, merit-based federal grant funding for infrastructure projects in St. Louis, Washington, and Kansas City Missouri after the U.S. Department of Transportation approved federal TIGER Grants to the Central Corridor Transit Enhancement and Job Access program (Cortex) in St. Louis, which received $10,300,000—to the new Route 47 Missouri River Bridge in Washington, Mo., which received $10,000,000—and to the Mid-America Regional Council in Kansas City for its Workforce Connex project, which will receive a $1,200,000 planning grant

• Won Senate passage of a bipartisan bill to cut spending and eliminate unnecessary reports compiled by federal government agencies

• Successfully rallied support—including in events across Missouri—for renewal of the job-boosting Export-Import Bank

• Helped secure unanimous Senate approval for St. Louis native Kevin O’Malley to serve as U.S. Ambassador to Ireland

• Led a group of moderate Senators in an effort to protect consumers from unreasonable utility rate hikes—expressing concerns about the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed Clean Power Plan to reduce carbon pollution from the country’s power plants, and telling the agency to protect Missouri consumers and employers by making commonsense changes to the content and timeline of the proposed rule

• Won passage into law of provisions  to prohibit taxpayer funding from use by the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund, and to prohibit unsustainable projects that cannot be overseen by American personnel

• Worked with fellow Missouri Senator Roy Blunt and Congressman Blaine Luetkemeyer, successfully passing into law a measure allowing for the closure of the St. Clair, Mo. Regional Airport once all obligations to taxpayers are repaid, after the city of St. Clair worked unsuccessfully with the Federal Aviation Administration for more than three years to close the airport, facing continual delays by the agency

• Successfully pushed the Federal Aviation Administration and U.S. Transportation Secretary to approve an application by Southwest Airlines to continue daily non-stop service between Kansas City International Airport and Washington, DC’s Washington National Airport, following requests from the Kansas City Chamber of Commerce and the Kansas City Mayor’s office

• Teamed up with fellow Missouri Senator Roy Blunt to successfully pass into law a measure designating Kansas City’s Liberty Memorial as the nation’s “World War I Museum and Memorial”