Over the last year, some members of Congress have expressed concerns that undocumented individuals in the U.S. are receiving taxpayer-funded health care.

Over the past two months, the U.S. Department of Justice has begun releasing materials related to the legal case against the late Jeffrey Epstein. These materials are significant in their impact on the reputations of individuals named in the Epstein Files. In addition, the law's provisions mandating the release of the Epstein Files illustrate how members of Congress delegate tasks to the bureaucracy while maintaining control over its actions.

Many depictions of Congress use data to show a decline in the number of bills enacted, concluding that Congress is “broken” and increasingly incapable of getting anything done. In this brief, we take a closer look at the data.