- Congressman Hunter used is committee position to help kill an amendment sponsored by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) that would have required a Department of Defense spending bill report card revealing to the public all pork barrel spending in Congressional bills, along with the names of their sponsors. Why? His website brags about "helping local companies obtain defense contracts." One such company received a $9,000,000 contract to convert old Amry records regarding the Panama Canal to digitial archives. They Army did not want it, the GAO said it took money away from important programs.
- He voted for the largest expansion of Medicare since its creation, and voted to support a 2005 highway bill which was filled with tens of thousands of earmarks for Congressional spending projects, many unrelated to highways or even roads.
- He voted for No Child Left Behind.
- He voted to impose Sarbanes-Oxley accounting regulations on American businesses, making it diffciult for many small businesses to cope with the new red tape.
- He voted to support restrictions on free speech in political campaigns (McCain-Feingold) after first voting against it. In the 2000 election cycle he received $197,000 from defense industries. In 2005 he fell to second place with just $118,000.
- The Club for Growth says "he's been part of the big government spending spree of the last six years," and gave Hunter a 49% rating on its 2005 scorecard, that's 187th out of 230 Republicans in the House GOP Conference.
- While he had higher ratings from the National Taxpayers Union earlier in his career, the group now routinely gives Hunter "C" ratings.