Welcome Freshmen

This session saw eleven new State Representatives, and six new State Senators. Four of the State Senators were merely moving from one chamber to another with only Senators  Melinda Smyser (R-11) and Chuck Winder (R-14) having no record at all. How did these new legislators change things? Let’s take a look at the State House, first.

For the purposes of this comparison, the voting records of freshman State Representatives is being compared with the full-term records of their predecessors as the 14 votes scored on this scorecard are as many as the scored on both scorecards for last session.

The exception to this is Rep. Judy Boyle and Pat Takasugi. They both defeated appointees who only served in the 2008 session, which was less contentious and had fewer issues than the 2007 session. For this reason, the comparison is being made not to their immediate predecessors but rather their elected predecessors who sat in the 2007 session.

Analysis: A small change like +7 or -8 is really somewhat meaningless as that’s really only one vote. In terms of significant movement, four seats became more conservative than they were in 2007, and two became more liberal.

While Takasugi was not as conservative as Otter appointee Former Representative Curtis Bowers, he represents a huge upgrade over Bob Ring. Coupled with Boyle’s victory, what this suggests is that when many of these Canyon County and rural right-of-center Republicans retire, voters will choose far more conservative replacements.

Palmer is far more conservative than his predecessor who gave up his seat to challenge conservative Senator Shirley McKague (R-20) and Thompson’s (R-33) defeat of a Democrat led to a dramatic shift in that seat.

The big move in the opposite direction was far left liberal Burgoyne replacing a far more moderate Henbest. Gibbs’ early voting record is not as conservative as his predecessor and certainly not as conservative as his seatmate Thomas Loertscher (R-31.)

Overall though, the State House is much more conservative than it was in 2007. The Senate is a little different.

There was no earth-shattering move in the State legislature. Ironically, Senator Nicole LeFavour (D-19) (who had a 0% rating in the State House) boasts the significant difference in voting record with her predecessor through her votes on Highway funding.

Disappointing to some may be the record of Chuck Winder who defeated Bastian in the GOP Primary last year and through the first session, his voting record is quite similar to Bastian’s based on the number.  Bert Brackett’s Senate voting record isn’t as conservative as how he voted in the House, which must be considered disappointing. 

The State House became far more conservative as a result of the last elections, while the State Senate has pretty much remained stagnant

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