Political scientist (BYU). Banjos, flannel shirts, quiet trails. Author: Dead Hand's Grip (state constitutions @OUPAcademic), Utah Politics (@UnivNebPress).
Joined November 2010
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Apr 17
In the past 17 years, only two Utah legislators have introduced 10 bills in a single session but passed none of them: Trevor Lee and Blouin. Whether their inability to pass bills is related to the poor judgment alleged in recent headlines is left as an exercise for the reader.
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Apr 17
For context, it is easier to pass bills in the Utah Leg. than in Congress. Many are minor, suggested by some agency that noticed a need to tweak the law, then handed to a legislator of either party and passed near-unanimously. Inability to pass any bills often implies something.
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Mar 11
KSL asked Rep @Leah__Hansen about this. She said, "I wouldn't vote for a bill I hadn't read... For all the reading I did, I still didn't get to all the bills."
Imagine if all legislators had this rule. Utah legislators passed 344 bills last week alone--164 of them on Friday!
Mar 10
Legislators continue to struggle to find the "no" button, preferring to kill bills by slowrolling than by actually opposing. Only 3.3% of House votes failed, 2.3% in the Senate. Yet freshman Rep. @Leah__Hansen voted no on 54% (!) of votes, beating 23% by @NateForUtah. (3/11)
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Mar 10
Reply with your theory about why Utah legislators rarely vote no. I mean, they circled HB88 after speaking strongly against it rather than go on record voting "no," and they routinely vote "yes" (or "aye on 2") on other things after reservations. Why such fear of casting a "no"?
Mar 10
Legislators continue to struggle to find the "no" button, preferring to kill bills by slowrolling than by actually opposing. Only 3.3% of House votes failed, 2.3% in the Senate. Yet freshman Rep. @Leah__Hansen voted no on 54% (!) of votes, beating 23% by @NateForUtah. (3/11)
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Mar 10
In committee, legislators say "I'm voting to advance despite my concerns since my colleagues deserve to hear it on the floor," as if committees don't exist to screen. Or "I'm voting to advance, trusting you'll bring an amendment to the floor." Explain yourselves, legislators.
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Mar 10
A thread with more than you want to know about the Utah Legislature's 7-week General Session that just wrapped.
First: There were an absurd number of bill introductions (1,016), but only 540 bills passed--which would have been absurd 15 years ago but is now average. (1/11)
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Mar 10
It turns out our first third-party legislator in who knows how long was genuinely moderate. When I calculate ideology scores, Sen. Buss lands right in the middle @FWDUtah (10/11)
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Nerds will find lots more stats and figures at the link in my bio, then click "research" and "Utah Legislature."
If you like this stats overload, tag your favorite legislator, activist, or political reporter. Or your least favorite, I'm not your boss.
That's all. (11/11)
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Mar 10
Going through data on the Utah Legislature's recent session, and we've got an outlier.
Guess which legislator voted with his/her party only 47% of the time? (Everyone else was above 90%).
This legislator also voted "nay" 54% of the time. (Next highest was only 23%.)
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26 Feb 2025
With the Utah Legislature responding to major rulings last year by the Utah Supreme Court, here's a short thing I wrote for the NYU @BrennanCenter's @StateCourtRpt with everything you wanted to know about the Utah Constitution but didn't think to ask: statecourtreport.org/our-wor…
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3 Feb 2025
In case anyone is still using this place to follow the Utah Legislature, I made a thing for aggregating positions from interest groups that take positions on bills. Probably buggy, but give it a whirl:
adambrown.info/utlegtracker/
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