Analysis of Idaho State Legislature Concludes That Many Lawmakers are Aligning with the Wrong Party
By Sarah Clendenon • December 20, 2023A Washington DC firm, The Institute for Legislative Analysis (ILA), has published its report on the 2023 voting records of all 105 Idaho Legislators.
ILA describes its mission as,
“Advancing the limited government principles of the U.S. Constitution by increasing transparency within Congress and the 50 state legislatures.”
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ILA uses a scoring system they have dubbed the Limited Government Index (LGI). They call this the “ultimate scorecard,” and based its creation on the work of the American Conservative Union’s ratings work, which took a decade to develop.
“With over 38,665 votes the LGI’s congressional application has more unique sampled roll calls than the federal scorecards produced by over a dozen of the leading national policy groups – combined. The team is also taking the policy analysis within the LGI to the next level, as every bill or vote rated includes an in-depth analysis of its contents and how the measure aligns with or against the limited government principles of the U.S. Constitution.”
ILA’s goal is to use this information and knowledge to have its biggest impact at the state legislative level.
“…it is largely a mystery as to where each of our country’s 7,383 state lawmakers stand on policy. This will require the ILA’s team of policy analysts to utilize a limited government and constitutional lens to evaluate the over 100,000 bills introduced across the 50 state legislatures in order to provide an individual rating for every single state lawmaker.”
ILA describes its process, procedures, and methodology for analysis:
“The ILA’s research process consists of multiple steps to ensure every key bill, amendment and procedural vote is properly analyzed and rated. The ILA team reviews bill testimony, fiscal notes and text, shifts through hundreds of thousands of pages within legislative journals, monitors local media reporting, and consults with local policy experts that follow the legislatures. Additionally, all policy analysts are specially trained to navigate the unique legislative procedures of the 50 state capitols to select the correct votes and bill versions.
These tools break down complex bills into short summaries while recording how each lawmaker voted. As a result, any individual can easily comprehend all of the policies that were voted upon and where their lawmakers stand.”
The results and conclusions of the Idaho analysis are that,
“…a number of Idaho lawmakers are incorrectly aligning themselves with political parties that do not match their values based on their voting records.”
ILA also rates the behavior of the Governor.
“The analysis found that Governor Brad Little sided with the Limited Government position 42.53% of the time which corresponds to a Democratic political philosophy. The data revealed that Governor Little strongly aligned with limited government on policies relating to election integrity and individual liberties but aligns with the progressive wing of the Democratic party on fiscal, spending, and regulatory-related issues.”
The full ILA press release regarding Idaho:
“WASHINGTON, DC – A just released study on the Idaho Legislature has found a number of Idaho lawmakers are incorrectly aligning themselves with political parties that do not match their values based on their voting records. The findings are part of an analysis of 5,670 lawmaker votes conducted by the Institute for Legislative Analysis (ILA) a national policy and data hub recently established by the former scorecard team of the American Conservative Union (CPAC).
The study reassigned each lawmaker to the correct political party that matches their philosophical values based upon their votes. The data reveals that philosophically Democratic lawmakers are actually in control of the State Senate (21 Democrats to 14 Republicans) while philosophically Republican lawmakers are holding onto a narrow majority in the State House of Representatives (38 Republicans to 32 Democrats). All lawmakers are placed on a 0 to 100 political ideology scale based on their adherence to the limited government principles of the U.S. Constitution. Scores of “0% – 50%” equate a Democrat philosophy while scores of “51% – 100%” mark a Republican philosophy.
The ILA applies the same methodology to every state it researches. In most states including California, Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania not a single self-defined Republican scored below a 60%. Idaho represents one of the very worst cases of fraudulent party identification, perhaps even worse than what ILA recently exposed in Wyoming.
The ILA also evaluated the bill signage and veto history of Idaho’s Governor through the nation’s first legislative Governor rating system. The analysis found that Governor Brad Little sided with the Limited Government position 42.53% of the time which corresponds to a Democratic political philosophy. The data revealed that Governor Little strongly aligned with limited government on policies relating to election integrity and individual liberties but aligns with the progressive wing of the Democratic party on fiscal, spending and regulatory-related issues. The Governor and every lawmaker is provided separate ratings across 10 key policy categories to help better pinpoint political party alignment.
“Unfortunately, it appears a significant number of philosophically Democratic lawmakers have decided to mislabel their party affiliation as ‘Republican.’ said Ryan McGowan, CEO of the Institute for Legislative Analysis. “This deceptive practice by ‘Republican’ lawmakers should greatly concern the citizens of Idaho as it is resulting in the implementation of Big Government policies. Such policies are familiar to progressive states like California or New York, places with values I don’t think are shared by many in the Gem State.”
Earlier this year, the ILA produced the most comprehensive and in-depth vote record analysis ever conducted on Congress made up of nearly 40,000 votes. In September, the ILA released a policy record analysis spanning 10,000 actions taken by Donald Trump, Nikki Haley, Ron DeSantis, Chris Christie, Tim Scott and Mike Pence.”
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The full Idaho report can be found here: ID-Guide-2023.pdf (limitedgov.org)
Kootenai County Republican Central Committee Chairman and Chairman of the Idaho Freedom Foundation, Brent Regan, tweeted the ILA conclusion:
“A just released study on the Idaho Legislature has found a number of Idaho lawmakers are incorrectly aligning themselves with political parties that do not match their values based on their voting records.”
Several Idaho lawmakers shared the report on Twitter, adding their own thoughts to the posts.
Idaho Dispatch reached out and asked for comment from two of the Senators the analysis found to have “mislabeled their party affiliation as Republican,” Senate Pro Tempore Chuck Winder (D20-Meridian) and Senator Scott Grow (D14-Eagle). This article will be updated if responses are received.
Tags: 2023 Idaho Legislature, 2023 Legislative Session, American Conservative Union, Brent Regan, Governor Brad Little, ILA, Legislative Analysis, LGI, Limited Government Index, Political Party Affiliation, Representative Josh Tanner, Scorecard, Senator Brian Lenney, Senator Scott Herdon, The Institute for Legislative Analysis, Voting Record
20 thoughts on “Analysis of Idaho State Legislature Concludes That Many Lawmakers are Aligning with the Wrong Party”
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Well now, not that we needed it, but this is pretty solid confirmation of what we’ve all been seeing plainly for a long time now. It should prove interesting to see what kind of reaction there will be from state lawmakers who’ve been outed by this report. I think I know what the public reaction will be from the request for reponse from Winder and Grow…at least publicly. If anything the response(s) will be all wind and no rain…in other words what we continually see and hear from the office of Brad Little (D).
A concept that I’ve found that often needs to be explained for those fleeing from liberal states that an (R) does not equate to conservative principles.
What? Chuck Winder is on that list? I never would have guessed! Nor would have ever suspected our grand governor is a statist! /s
Every conservative running for office needs to post these numbers. And this does nothing but vindicate Dorothy Moon.
Exactly Blair, Dorothy (and Bongino) are correct, I wonder what the odds are that pour Marxist propaganda news organizations will air this valuable info and out their political allies?
So Bongino is correct in his belief that most Republicans are actually Democrats, but no Democrats are actually Republicans. No wonder it’s such a Sisyphean feat to get shit done.
He is indeed. We’re being f’d by lying sacks o chit hiding behind the (R) badge.
The swamp is alive and well in Idaho. Since Idaho voters will elect anyone with an (R) next to their name how do we overcome the big donor bought and paid for RINO’s the Idaho Republican party supports in the primaries?
How can we take our country back when we are losing our state at the local level?
As Bongino says We are the leaders we’ve been waiting for.
SURPRISE! Yeah, not surprised, not one bit. We’ve known this for years now, yet they continue to get voted in. I’ve said it once, I’ll say it again:
Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different outcome each time.
And I agree, just because you have an “R” next to your name, it doesn’t mean you’re conservative. And now its brought to light once again, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re an “R” either.
I doubt that anyone who has lived in Idaho for any length of time will be surprised at this revelation as Idaho has been under siege by these phony republicans for over a decade. It is like a slow growing cancer in our legislature and even in our cities like Boise and Meridian. This is exactly how they turned Colorado Blue and anyone who doesn’t think it is happening here is delusional. Idahoans have been deceived because they don’t do their homework or pay attention to the many onerous bills that our legislature has passed in the last 10 years. Sure there is always a lot of fanfare when they pass an anti-abortion bill or something similar but in reality, this was all an act to make you think we were voting for conservatives. Organizations like IACI and the Medical co-op associations with their political Pac’s have been at the forefront of getting these people elected and they continue their purge of conservatives with each new election. Idahoans should by now have a clear picture of what these Republicrats are up to by the actions of Senate Pro Tempore Chuck Winder as he removes true conservatives from important positions on legislative committees. This conversion of Idaho from Red to Blue is like a virus that we need to find a cure for rather quickly if we want to take our state back. The big corporate money and old guard republicans have been leading the charge to expand our state budget and suck up as many federal dollars with their Memorandums of Understand attached. We have a failing infrastructure, a failing education system and a failing Health and Welfare Dept (Currently under investigation) while our taxes continue to climb higher each and every year. Idahoans had better wake up soon and replace these phony Republicrats with some solid conservatives and stop this movement for Rank Choice Voting or as a state we are destined to become another Bureaucratic Blue State. “We get the government we deserve.”
So, someone had to go clear to some out of state “think tank” (more like drunk with self-importance tank) to come up with this. All they had to do was go to the all knowing Brent Regan for this brilliant synopsis. Not complaining about some of the points being made here, just the source.
I think we all know which side your on Mr. Goldthorpe. It is elected officials like you who are the problem instead of the solution. At least Regan is willing to tell it like it is unlike you who wouldn’t know a conservative from a liberal if they came up and bit you in the butt.
Agree, Tea Party Bob. Goldthorpe provides entertainment on this website, but nothing substantive because he is a good ol’ boy establishment Republican.
An out of State “think tank” confirming what voters already know is not as big a threat to Idaho values as out of State developers, corporations or large PACs that support a political narrative and philosophy that is the antithesis of conservative values.
The problem really comes down to money and influence in the system. We should limit campaign contributions at every level of government to $100 or less—-including from large corporations and lobbyist—no bundling and all contributions from citizens that reside in the district and businesses that do business in the district.. IACI/IMA/IHA/IEA have more influence over the process of legislation and the bureaucratic deep state in Idaho than citizens.
No lunches at the Arid Club and do away with The Governor’s Cup
Why is Brian Lenney such a badass? He’s LIGHTYEARS more conservative than loser Jeff Agenbroad was.
This is how Idaho has always been. They have simply started putting R’s next to their names to make uninterested and apathetic so called conservative R voting Idahoans think they are getting what they want.
In fact they are not. Nor do they care.
Then they (fake conservative Republican Congress people ) call out all the media and advertising money can buy to broadcast all over Idaho one “conservative” thing they have done or support and simply stab the constituents in the back 90% of the time knowing the voters are just to stupid and don’t care to find out or really know what they are doing the rest of the time.
Stupid is as stupid IS.
It is easier to fool some one than convince them they have been fooled. Especially when they prefer to hear, believe and accept the lies.
People feel more connected to the leadership that reflects how and what they really are.
People without integrity prefer their government to be despotic and without integrity as they are.
We get the Government we deserve. “Nugie”
Here is your Republic if you can keep it. It only works for a (Christian) religious and virtuous people. That’s not mine either.
All you have to do is look at Senator Geoff Schroeder holding his “Atheist” license plate and telling the crowd that all you have to do is put an “R” behind your name to get elected in Idaho. Too bad Elmore County voters didn’t see it as they overwhelmingly voted him into office.
corrupt podunk zombie voters installing these republicrats. how those boots taste
It doesn’t matter the dumbed down tv watchers will keep reelecting their incumbent with out a speck of discernment.
Many like me will vote for DJT and leave the rest of the ballot blank. The establishment candidates may very well win reelection but their total votes versus DJTs votes will pale in comparison.
Many like me will vote for DJT and leave the rest of the ballot blank. The establishment candidates may very well win reelection but their total votes versus DJTs votes will pale in comparison.