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Ideology scores for the Utah House of Representatives, 2015

Political scientists have developed advanced algorithms that can calculate each legislator's ideology score based on his or her legislative voting record. Here I use the W-NOMINATE method (it's an acronym, hence the caps). Important caveats:

  1. Ideology scores have no scale. There is not a number that means "liberal" or "conservative." Scores have only relative meaning, so that a lower score indicates a more liberal voting record than a higher score.
  2. Scores are only comparable within a single chamber, within a single year. You cannot compare House scores to Senate scores, and you cannot compare 2018 scores to 2019 scores. (That's because of caveat #1: Scores have no scale.)
  3. Scores reflect what comes to the floor. In a supermajority Republican Legislature, most fights are between moderate Republicans and conservative Republicans, not between Republicans and Democrats. Thus, scores calculated from votes in the Utah Legislature will reveal more daylight among Republicans than among Democrats.
  4. Zero does not mean "moderate," it just means "the middle of this group of legislators." See the preceding point. Also, "moderate" Utah Republican legislators are usually pretty conservative on a national scale.
  5. Scores close to 100 are not "most loyal Republicans." Even calling these "most conservative" would be very misleading, since it implies these legislators come closest to some conservative standard. Utah is a very conservative state, and a legislator near the middle of this particular Republican pack is likewise very conservative. Scores near 100 indicate Republicans at the extreme end of the scale, who are to the right of even most Republicans, and perhaps well to the right of the Republican party platform.

You can find a thorough discussion of these ideology scores at the Utah data points blog.

The scores below are for 2015 in the Utah House of Representatives. Select a different year here:
House: - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014 - 2015 - 2016 - 2017 - 2018 - 2019
Senate: - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014 - 2015 - 2016 - 2017 - 2018 - 2019

Distribution of scores

The plot below summarizes how many legislators fall into each score range. There is one "D" for each Democrat in the given range, and one "R" for each Republican. There are 75 legislators in the Utah House of Representatives.

 -100 to -90 | DD
-90.1 to -80 | DDDD
-80.1 to -70 | DD
-70.1 to -60 | DDD
-60.1 to -50 | D
-50.1 to -40 | 
-40.1 to -30 | 
-30.1 to -20 | R
-20.1 to -10 | RR
  -10.1 to 0 | R
   0.1 to 10 | RRRR
  10.1 to 20 | RRRRRRRRR
  20.1 to 30 | RRRRRRRRRR
  30.1 to 40 | RRRRRRRRRR
  40.1 to 50 | RRRRRR
  50.1 to 60 | RRRRR
  60.1 to 70 | RRRRRRR
  70.1 to 80 | RRR
  80.1 to 90 | RRR
 90.1 to 100 | RR

Detailed ideology data

If you use this data in published work, please credit me appropriately.

Legislator Party Chamber Year Ideology score
Briscoe, Joel K. D House 2015 -96.6
Arent, Patrice M. D House 2015 -92.1
King, Brian S. D House 2015 -88.5
Chavez-Houck, Rebecca D House 2015 -88.2
Romero, Angela D House 2015 -85.4
Hollins, Sandra D House 2015 -82.9
Moss, Carol Spackman D House 2015 -77.2
Poulson, Marie H. D House 2015 -72.1
Wheatley, Mark A. D House 2015 -67.1
Duckworth, Susan D House 2015 -66.2
Miller, Justin J. D House 2015 -62.1
King, Brad D House 2015 -51.3
Powell, Kraig R House 2015 -21.0
Hall, Craig R House 2015 -16.2
Edwards, Rebecca P. R House 2015 -15.1
Ward, Raymond P. R House 2015 -0.3
Handy, Stephen G. R House 2015 1.3
Nelson, Merrill F. R House 2015 4.9
Pitcher, Dixon M. R House 2015 6.1
Snow, V. Lowry R House 2015 8.4
Cutler, Bruce R. R House 2015 10.1
Spendlove, Robert M. R House 2015 10.7
Anderson, Johnny R House 2015 10.8
Westwood, John R. R House 2015 11.1
Sagers, Douglas R House 2015 11.5
McIff, Kay L. R House 2015 13.5
Perry, Lee B. R House 2015 14.3
DiCaro, Sophia M. R House 2015 14.9
Draxler, Jack R. R House 2015 17.0
Eliason, Steve R House 2015 21.9
Dunnigan, James A. R House 2015 22.7
Dee, Brad L. R House 2015 23.0
Tanner, Earl D. R House 2015 24.4
Redd, Edward H. R House 2015 25.9
Ray, Paul R House 2015 26.6
Last, Bradley G. R House 2015 27.2
Ipson, Don L. R House 2015 28.1
Webb, R. Curt R House 2015 28.4
Froerer, Gage R House 2015 29.8
Sandall, Scott D. R House 2015 30.5
Peterson, Jeremy A. R House 2015 30.8
Christensen, LaVar R House 2015 32.7
Wilson, Brad R. R House 2015 34.0
Hutchings, Eric K. R House 2015 34.8
Brown, Melvin R. R House 2015 37.6
Cox, Jon R House 2015 38.1
Cox, Fred C. R House 2015 38.2
Hawkes, Timothy D. R House 2015 38.5
Sanpei, Dean R House 2015 39.0
Chew, Scott H. R House 2015 40.2
Hughes, Gregory H. R House 2015 41.8
Noel, Michael E. R House 2015 42.2
Cunningham, Rich R House 2015 42.7
Schultz, Mike R House 2015 45.0
Fawson, Justin L. R House 2015 45.5
Barlow, Stewart R House 2015 51.0
Lifferth, David E. R House 2015 52.2
Christofferson, Kay J. R House 2015 58.8
Grover, Keith R House 2015 59.5
Daw, Bradley M. R House 2015 59.6
Stanard, Jon E. R House 2015 62.4
McKell, Mike K. R House 2015 62.6
Gibson, Francis D. R House 2015 66.7
Ivory, Ken R House 2015 67.8
Oda, Curtis R House 2015 67.8
Kennedy, Michael S. R House 2015 67.8
Thurston, Norman K. R House 2015 68.8
Coleman, Kim R House 2015 71.3
Peterson, Val L. R House 2015 77.2
Stratton, Keven J. R House 2015 77.3
Anderegg, Jacob L. R House 2015 81.7
Roberts, Marc K. R House 2015 86.0
McCay, Daniel R House 2015 86.3
Knotwell, John R House 2015 90.2
Greene, Brian M. R House 2015 91.7