WASHINGTON, D.C. — Club for Growth Foundation today released its Missed Votes Arizona Scorecards for the Legislature’s 2021 regular session. The newly launched Missed Votes Scorecards calculate how often lawmakers show up to vote and how often they miss votes.
Lawmakers miss votes for a whole host of reasons, including medical issues, family concerns, prior commitments, purely political motivations, or other reasons. The Club for Growth Foundation generally doesn’t analyze why a lawmaker has missed a vote and is simply publishing this quantified information for educational purposes only.
According to Club for Growth Foundation President David McIntosh, “Constituents need to know the missed votes records of their representatives so they can decide for themselves if elected officials are avoiding a difficult vote or have a legitimate reason for missing a particular vote. Sadly, this information is often not available, and that is why the Club for Growth Foundation is publishing Missed Votes scorecards.”
This scorecard is based on a review of all floor votes taken in the Arizona Legislature from January 28, 2021 to June 30, 2021. There are inherent limitations in judging the overall qualifications of any legislator based on how many votes he or she has missed, and the Club for Growth Foundation does not endorse or oppose any legislator for public office.
Key Insights
Arizona Senate
The average Arizona senator missed 2 percent of 737 total floor votes, with Republican senators on average missing 2 percent of all floor votes and Democrat senators on average missing 2 percent of all floor votes. Sen. Michelle Ugenti-Rita (SD-23) missed the most votes – 65 out of 737 – for a score of 9 percent missed votes.
By not missing a single vote, the following senators received a perfect attendance score:
- Nancy Barto (SD-15)
- Sean Bowie (SD-18)
- Karen Fann (SD-1)
- Rick Gray (SD-21)
- Vince Leach (SD-11)
- Juan Mendez (SD-26)
- Tony Navarrete (SD-30)
- Jamescita Peshlakai (SD-7)
- Thomas Shope (SD-8)
Arizona House of Representatives
The average Arizona House member missed 2 percent of 772 total floor votes, with Republican members on average missing 1 percent of all floor votes and Democrat members on average missing 5 percent of all floor votes. Rep. Cesar Chavez (HD-29) missed the most votes – 114 out of 772 – for a score of 15 percent missed votes. By not missing a single vote, the following House members received a perfect attendance score:
- Leo Biasiucci (HD-5)
- Walter Blackman (HD-6)
- Reginald Bolding (HD-27)
- Shawnna Bolick (HD-20)
- Frank Carroll (HD-22)
- Timothy Dunn (HD-13)
- Gail Griffin (HD-14)
- Steve Kaiser (HD-15)
- Aaron Lieberman (HD-28)
- Jennifer Longdon (HD-24)
- Quang Nguyen (HD-1)
- Becky Nutt (HD-14)
- Joanne Osborne (HD-13)
- Jennifer Pawlik (HD-17)
- Beverly Pingerelli (HD-21)
- Judy Schwiebert (HD-20)
- Ben Toma (HD-22)
- Myron Tsosie (HD-7)
- Michelle Udall (HD-25)
We asked lawmakers who missed at least 10 percent of the votes if they’d like us to include an explanation. Here are the responses we received: