WASHINGTON, D.C. — Club for Growth Foundation today released its Missed Votes Colorado scorecard for the General Assembly’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 Colorado Legislature from January 13, 2021, to June 8, 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. We expect all lawmakers to know their own voting records ahead of this publication.
Key Insights
Colorado Senate
The average Colorado senator missed 2 percent of 984 total floor votes, with Republican senators on average missing 3 percent of all floor votes and Democrat senators on average missing 2 percent of all floor votes. Sen. Ray Scott (SD-7) missed the most votes – 107 out of 984– for a score of 11 percent missed votes. By not missing a single vote, the following senators received a perfect attendance score:
- James Coleman (SD-33)
- Stephen Fenberg (SD-18)
- Dennis Hisey (SD-2)
- Sanford Lee (SD-11)
- Dominick Moreno (SD-21)
- Brittany Pettersen (SD-22)
- Faith Winter (SD-24)
Colorado House of Representatives
The average Colorado House member missed 3 percent of 1,089 total floor votes, with Republican members on average missing 3 percent of all floor votes and Democrat members on average missing 5 percent of all floor votes. Rep. Jennifer Arndt (HD-53) missed the most votes – 93 out of 414 – for a score of 22 percent missed votes. Jennifer Arndt resigned from her seat on April 16, 2021 after being elected to be the mayor of Fort Collins. Andrew Boesenecker was appointed to fill the seat on April 28, 2021. No House members received a perfect attendance score.
We asked lawmakers who missed at least 10 percent of the votes if they’d like us to include an explanation. Here is the response we received:
Rep. Stephanie Luck (HD-47)
I take my responsibility of serving seriously, and as such, would not have missed any votes had I been able to make them. Unfortunately, I had a medical condition (not COVID) that caused me to miss three days of session – two of which I spent in the hospital.