Sen. John McCain, Republican of Arizona

Education

• Believes all federal financial support should be predicated on giving parents the ability to move their children, and the dollars associated with them, from failing schools to ones that meet higher standards.

• Supports the Troops-to-Teachers Act, a program to train veterans to become teachers, and introduced legislation to extend the program.

Source: McCain campaign here and here

Estate Tax

• Would allow heirs to exempt $5-million from estate taxes, up from $2-million now (both amounts doubled for couples), and would cut the tax rate for amounts above that from 45 percent to 15 percent.

• Voted for an amendment in 2007 (S. Amdt. 507) to raise the exemption to $5-million and cut the tax rate to 35 percent. (Amendment defeated.)

Source: McCain campaign

Federal Budget Deficit

• Would consider a spending freeze on everything but defense, veterans affairs, and "entitlement" programs like Social Security.

Source: Transcript, debate with Barack Obama, September 26, 2008

Federal Government and Charities

• "The essence of volunteerism starts at the grass-roots level, does not start necessarily at the federal-government level." The government should not "stifle" organizations that "have no dependence whatsoever on our federal government and do such a great job for all our citizens."

Source: Transcript, ServiceNation presidential forum

Health

• Would promote federal research into autism, promote early screening, and identify better treatment options for the disorder. Co-sponsored the Combating Autism Act of 2006.

Source: McCain campaign

International Aid

• Would create a League of Democracies that could "act where the U.N. fails to act, to relieve human suffering in places like Darfur. It could join to fight the AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa and fashion better policies to confront the crisis of our environment."

• Would set a goal of eradicating malaria in Africa.

Source: McCain campaign here and here

National Service

• Would create a White House Service to America office to streamline national-service efforts, hold "volunteerism summits" where people could share information about effective programs in their communities, and get more students participating in the federal work-study program to do community service.

• Co-sponsor of the Serve America Act, S. 3487, which would expand the number of participants in year-long national-service programs to 250,000 by 2013 and create new federal service programs involving older Americans and high-school and college students.

Source: McCain campaign

Nonprofit Groups

• Co-sponsor of the Serve America Act S. 3487, which would create "community solutions funds" to help nonprofit groups copy and expand innovative programs to help low-income people; "innovation fellowships" to help individuals start charities; and "volunteer generation funds" to help charities recruit more volunteers.

Poverty

• Voted to create the State Children's Health Insurance Program in 1997. Voted against a 2007 bill to expand it by $35-billion over five years in 2007, saying he was concerned the program had expanded beyond Congress's original intent.

Source: McCain statement

Religious Organizations

• Supports President Bush's efforts to make it easier for religious groups to get federal dollars to provide social services. Disagrees with Senator Obama's proposal to bar grant recipients from using federal money to discriminate in hiring on the basis of religion

Source: McCain campaign

About the Candidate's Background

Donations to Charity

• In 2007, John McCain contributed $105,467 of his $405,409 income to charity, according to his tax returns, which represented 26 percent of his total income. In 2006, he donated 18 percent — $64,695 of $358,414 in income — to charitable efforts.

• According to Mr. McCain's campaign, most of his charitable contributions were made through the John and Cindy McCain Family Foundation, which supports organizations that work "for the spiritual, educational, and medical needs of the community." Supported organizations include Operation Smile, which repairs facial abnormalities in young people, and the Halo Trust, which removes land mines.

• Cindy McCain, an heir to a beer fortune who keeps most of her finances separate from her husband's, did not release her 2007 tax return or disclose how much she donated to charity on her own. But Senator McCain said she donated the same amount he did, $105,467, from their joint assets.

• Senator McCain donates royalties from his books and increases in his Senate salary to charity.

Source: McCain campaign

Charity Affiliations

• Charity affiliations: Serves on the board of the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum, in New York, which is devoted to the Intrepid aircraft carrier (on which Senator McCain was a crew member); and the honorary advisory board of the Foundation for Melanoma Research, in Philadelphia. Has served on a variety of other boards, including those of the Council on Foreign Relations, Gallaudet University, the International Republican Institute, the Nixon Center for Peace and Freedom, and the Partnership for Public Service.

Spouse's Nonprofit Interests

• Cindy McCain founded and ran the American Voluntary Medical Team, which provided medical care to poor children worldwide, from 1988 to 1995. She currently serves on the boards of Grateful Nation Montana, which provides scholarships to children of Montana soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan; the Halo Trust, which removes landmines; and Operation Smile, which provides facial reconstruction surgery to children in poor countries. She is on leave from a position on the board of CARE, the international humanitarian-aid group.