Legislative regular session-plus scores, 2020

With everything dealt with, the Louisiana Legislature log presents its 2020 Louisiana Legislature scorecard. In a first, it actually will combine both Regular and First Extraordinary Session votes to compile this since the latter really acted as an appendage to the former.

Thirteen bills were selected and weighed for computation. These were chosen mainly from the watch list compiled throughout the session. For a bill’s vote(s) to be selected, in one chamber there had to be more than one legislator not voting for the winning or losing side.

Being that passage of bills depends upon the seated membership of a body, not voting is counted as a negative vote. However, if a legislator had a leave of absence granted for that day, his absent votes weren’t counted for bills voted on that day and the score adjusted to take that into account. The governor wasn’t scored on two items because they were constitutional amendments.

Here are the bills with votes for final passage in every case on which the scorecard was computed, with the conservative/reform position and the weighing indicated, beginning with the regular session:

HB 140 – would protect rights of businesses in affirming Second Amendment protections; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (10 percent).

HB 241 – would expunge criminal records prematurely; a vote against connotes a conservative/reform preference (5 percent).

HB 328 – would create an unneeded tax exception; a vote against connotes a conservative/reform preference (5 percent).

HB 334 – would increase security in houses of worship; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (10 percent).

HB 445 – would create a lockbox for unclaimed property funds; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (10 percent).

HB 464 – would create a more realistic way of computing the spending limit in the Constitution; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (5 percent).

HB 469 – would create a more realistic way of computing the spending limit in statute; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (5 percent).

HB 746 – would increase individual security in emergency situations; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (10 percent).

HB 819 – would allow more maladies not proven to be affected by medical marijuana added to the list of its permitted uses and its distribution exanded; a vote against connotes a conservative/reform preference (5 percent).

SB 418 – would achieve tort reform by removing process biases that inflate costs; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (5 percent).

SB 423 – creates the overdue transition to formation of the new city of St. George; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (10 percent).

And from the special session:

HB 57 – would achieve tort reform by removing process biases that inflate costs; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (15 percent).

SB 9 – would make seat belt usage admissible evidence in tort trials; a vote for connotes a conservative/reform preference (5 percent).

These are the results for the House:

Amedee	100	Republican
Garafalo	100	Republican
Butler	95	Republican
Edmonds	95	Republican
Edmonston	95	Republican
Mack	95	Republican
Miguez	95	Republican
Mincey	95	Republican
Muscarello	95	Republican
Pressly	95	Republican
Thomas	95	Republican
Bacala	90	Republican
Beaullieu	90	Republican
Carrier	90	Republican
Crews	90	Republican
Deshotel	90	Republican
DuBuisson	90	Republican
Dwight	90	Republican
Echols	90	Republican
Farnum	90	Republican
Fontenot	90	Republican
Gadberry	90	Republican
Goudeau	90	Republican
Harris, L	90	Republican
Henry, Charles	90	Republican
Horton	90	Republican
Huval	90	Republican
Ivey	90	Republican
Magee	90	Republican
Nelson	90	Republican
Seabaugh	90	Republican
St. Blanc	90	Republican
Tarver, P	90	Republican
Thompson	90	Democrat
Villio	90	Republican
Wheat	90	Republican
Bagley	85	Republican
Borriaque	85	Republican
Emerson	85	Republican
Firment	85	Republican
Freiberg	85	Republican
Illg	85	Republican
Johnson, M	85	Republican
Kerner	85	Republican
McCormick	85	Republican
McKnight	85	Republican
Miller, G	85	Republican
Owen, C	85	Republican
Romero	85	Republican
Schamerhorn	85	Republican
Schexnayder	85	Republican
Stefanski	85	Republican
Turner	85	Republican
Wright	85	Republican
Adams	80	Independent
Davis	80	Republican
DeVillier	80	Republican
Frieman	80	Republican
Hilferty	80	Republican
Hollis	80	Republican
McMahen	80	Republican
Owen, R	80	Republican
Riser	80	Republican
Bishop	75	Republican
Coussan	75	Republican
Zeringue	75	Republican
Brown	70	Democrat
Johnson, T	70	Democrat
LaCombe	70	Democrat
Marino	70	Independent
McFarland	70	Republican
White	70	Democrat
Hodges	65	Republican
Cormier	60	Democrat
Stagni	60	Republican
Brass	55	Democrat
Carter, R	50	Democrat
Freeman	50	Democrat
Jenkins	50	Democrat
Miller, D	50	Democrat
Moore	50	Democrat
Pierre	50	Democrat
Carpenter	45	Democrat
Cox	45	Democrat
Selders	45	Democrat
Gaines	40	Democrat
Green	40	Democrat
Hughes	40	Democrat
Carter, G	35	Democrat
Jefferson	35	Democrat
Jordan	35	Democrat
Landry	35	Democrat
Bryant	30	Democrat
Lyons	30	Democrat
Carter, W	25	Democrat
Marcelle	25	Democrat
Phelps	25	Democrat
Willard	25	Democrat
Duplessis	15	Democrat
Glover	15	Democrat
Jones	15	Democrat
Lavardain	15	Democrat
James	10	Democrat
Newell	5	Democrat

(Only 104 were scored, since the late Republican state Rep. Reggie Bagala died after the chamber had met only a few times.)

More than most years, absences affected scores since now House member took leave on days of any of these votes. For example, Democrat state Rep. Cedric Glover scored 15, but every point came from his being absent without leave and missing votes on bills not conservative/reform in orientation. In fact, he missed every single vote without leave of absence.

The party-sorting that started a few years ago continued to intensify. Of the highest 66 scorers, 64 were Republicans with just Democrat state Rep. Francis Thompson and no party state Rep. Roy Daryl Adams for company – and all scored at least 70. The next nine featured five Democrats, three Republicans, and a no party representative. The remaining 29 lowest scorers all were Democrats. With the average GOP score of 86.64 and for Democrats 40.43, this led to the second-highest partisan gap (since the scorecard began in 2004) behind only the 2007 House with the lame duck Democrat former Gov. Kathleen Blanco in office and former GOP Gov. Bobby Jindal ready to steamroll his way into office.

This was due to the most conservative/reform Republican bloc in scorecard history, not so much a liberal/populist delegation of Democrats. The past three years have seen the three highest GOP scores in history, and in the past five (with Democrat Gov. John Bel Edwards at the state’s helm) the four highest. This has pulled Democrats along, to make over the five years their average around 39. So, even as the gap grows and sorting becomes purer, House Democrats are edging towards centrist voting because of the size of the Republican majority, which affects what measures come to votes. It mirrors, in reverse, Blanco’s term when Republicans averaged around 67 and Democrats 32.

The Senate showed an even more exaggerated pattern:

Hewitt	100	Republican
Abraham	95	Republican
Cloud	95	Republican
White, B	95	Republican
Womack	95	Republican
Cortez	85	Republican
Fesi	85	Republican
Hensgens	85	Republican
McMath	85	Republican
Mills, R	85	Republican
Mizell	85	Republican
Morris	85	Republican
Pope	85	Republican
Reese	85	Republican
Ward	85	Republican
Henry, Cameron	83	Republican
Allain	80	Republican
Cathey	80	Republican
Foil	80	Republican
Lambert	80	Republican
Bernard	75	Republican
Connick	75	Republican
Johns	75	Republican
Peacock	75	Republican
Smith	70	Democrat
Talbot	70	Republican
Milligan	65	Republican
Mills, F	65	Republican
Tarver, G	65	Democrat
Harris, J	60	Democrat
Luneau	55	Democrat
Barrow	47	Democrat
Price	45	Democrat
Bouie	39	Democrat
Boudreaux	38	Democrat
Carter, T	29	Democrat
Jackson	25	Democrat
Fields	20	Democrat
Peterson	0	Democrat

The influence of missed votes affected even more the distribution here. Democrat state Sen. Greg Tarver’s pattern of missed unexcused and excused votes inflated his score, while unexcused missed votes by GOP state Sens. Barry Milligan and Kirk Talbot depressed theirs. Remove Democrat state Sen. Gary Smith, however, and every single Republican would have scored higher than every single Democrat except for Tarver tied at the tail end. Significantly, for the first time in years, no GOP senator fell 50 or below, demonstrating the impact of several departures due to term limits

The same pull to conservative/reform preferences also was visible. Only eight, all Democrats, scored below even 50. The partisan numbers were close to those of the House: 82.72 average for Republicans and 41.07 for Democrats. This also was the highest partisan gap for scorecard history save 2007, although because Edwards had a firm grip over the Senate leadership over his first four years those scores have been more towards the historical mean than the highest. The GOP score was the highest in scorecard history.

Finally, Edwards also succumbed to the pull towards the center by the kinds of bills and choices the Republican majority left him, by registering his highest ever score, at 65. That closes the 2020 edition of the Louisiana Legislature Log. See you next time.