Delaware Accountability Project: the interim report 2023
Halfway through the session, we can already see which legislators need to be primaried and challenged.
For those of you who are new here, the Delaware Accountability Project tracks selected votes made by our state’s legislators. In the last session (2021-22) I graded them out on 50 votes for the first time, which was the largest number I have ever done. Whether I do 50 or not for this session will be determined by how many significant votes they make in 2024; however, given that I have 29 prospective votes this year, I’d say I have a shot at making it.
My format will be a little different in this case in that I will simply give the percentage of votes they have correct so far - bear in mind that I may not use all of the votes taken this year if I have to cull out a few next year. I also don’t account for absences and non-votes as I would in the standard DAP, coming out next summer.
From the best on down, here we go:
Richard Collins (House - 41) - 100%
Charles Postles, Jr. (House - 33) - 89.7%
Bryant Richardson (Senate - 21) - 84.2%
Gerald Hocker (Senate - 20) - 82.8%
Jesse Vanderwende (House - 35) - 82.8%
Shannon Morris (House - 30) - 79.3%
Jeff Hilovsky* (House - 4) - 77.8%
Lyndon Yearick (House - 34) - 73.1%
Bryan Shupe (House - 36) - 70.4%
David Wilson (Senate - 18) - 70.4%
Dave Lawson (Senate - 15) - 66.7%
Ronald Gray (House - 38) - 64.3%
Timothy Dukes (House - 40) - 63%
Ruth Briggs King (House - 37) - 57.7%
Brian Pettyjohn (Senate - 19) - 57.1%
Daniel Short (House - 39) - 56%
Jeff Spiegelman (House - 11) - 53.6%
Eric Buckson* (Senate - 16) - 44.4%
Michael Ramone (House - 21) - 39.1%
Kevin Hensley (House - 9) - 36%
Michael Smith (House - 22) - 28%
Sean Matthews (House - 10) - 10.7%
Sean Lynn (House - 31) - 7.4%
Nnamdi Chukwuocha (House - 1) - 3.4%
Peter Schwartzkopf (House - 14) - 3.4%
Everyone else - 0%
*Denotes legislators in their first term.
Positions 1-21 out of the 25 listed are all Republicans - 15 in the House, 6 in the Senate. The worst Republican is Michael Smith’s 28%. The last four listed are Democrats and they had a total of seven correct votes out of their 41 representatives. I didn’t list the other 37 who got zero correct.
I’ve noticed a big change in the scores between legislators who left and the ones who replaced them as well, based on the percentages between last session and this one so far. One was positive, but only because of redistricting.
House District 4: Gerald Brady/Charles Bud Freel (0%) to Jeff Hilovsky (77.8%). This district went from Democrat-controlled New Castle County to GOP-leaning Sussex County because of redistricting.
House District 13: John Mitchell (0%) to DeShanna Neal (0%). Since 2015, Mitchell had a 7.3% correct total but was 0-for-50 in the last term.
House District 18: David Bentz (0%) to Sophie Phillips (0%). Since his appointment in the 2015-16 term, Bentz only had a 4.7% correct total.
House District 20: Steve Smyk (55.1% in 2021-22, 50.8% since 2015) to Stell Parker Selby (0%). One of two more moderate Republicans to leave office, Smyk ran and lost to replace the other one. The district is now represented by a hardcore leftist, based on voting record. Bet she didn’t run as one.
House District 25: John Kowalko (2.1%) to Cyndie Romer (0%). Kowalko, who was defined as the first “progressive” to join the General Assembly back in 2006, still had a 13.2% total from 2015 despite turning hard-left in his last session. Now he looks downright moderate.
House District 32: Andria Bennett (14.3%) to Kerri Evelyn Harris (0%). Bennett was one of the more centrist Democrats, with a total since 2015 of 18.4%.
Senate District 6: Ernesto Lopez (52.1%) to Russell Huxtable (0%). This was the district where Smyk attempted but failed to succeed the retiring Lopez, meaning both his House district and the Senate district were lost by the GOP. Lopez, another moderate Republican, had a 43.6% record since 2015 - not great, but better than the zero his successor is putting up.
Senate District 14: Bruce Ennis (24.5%) to Kyra Hoffner (0%). Ennis was one of the old-guard centrist (to right-of-center on some issues) Democrats who retired after four decades in office. He had a 21.7% chart since 2015, but the district went to zero this year.
Senate District 16: Colin Bonini (76%) to Eric Buckson (44.4%). While the Republicans held the seat - obvious because no Democrat ran there - the primary upset by Buckson lost the GOP some of its conservative reliability. Bonini had a strong 79.7% rating since 2015 and rarely missed votes.
Out of nine seats, we only gained in one and that was only because the population voted with its feet by moving to Sussex County. Moreover, with the exception of Huxtable, the Democrats replaced every male who retired or lost their primary with a woman. Traditionally, this change has moved the seat leftward.
So what we need are strong conservative women, or, failing that, strong conservative men. And we need them to get their campaigns underway quickly before the leftists run this state further into the ground.
I’m happy to help by pointing out and destroying the leftists’ garbage voting records.