(Source: MIRS.news, Published 12/14/2022) The average number of missed roll call votes per Senate vote was at a 20-year high in 2022 and a 12-year high in the state House, based on calculations using the Missed Votes report at michiganvotes.org.
Senators missed 1,147 votes in 2022 for an average of 2.116 absent senators per vote, the highest number since an average of 3.04 absences per vote in 2002, the last year of Gov. John Engler's term.
Over in the House, the 4.466 absent members per vote in 2022 was the highest since the Democrats were last in charge of the chamber in 2010. That year the average was 4.72 misses per vote.
When the Mackinac Center for public policy began tracking this data in 2001, the average House vote was missing 7.993 members per vote in 2002. The Senate was missing 3.04 members per vote.
In the House, there were 4,056 missed votes in the 2021-22 term, more than the 3,187 missed during the 2019-20 term, when COVID was at its peak. In the 2009-10 term, 5,079 votes were missed.
Of the 3,420 missed votes in the 2021-22 term, 80% were from minority Democratic members.
The highest number of missed votes this term were by:
- Rep. Karen Whitsett (D-Detroit) (218 of 509)
- Sen. Erika Geiss (D-Taylor) (148 of 542)
- Rep. Cynthia A. Johnson (D-Detroit) (136 of 509)
- Sen. Sylvia Santana (D-Detroit) (133 of 542)
- Rep. Tenisha Yancey (D-Detroit) (132 of 509)
- Sen. Betty Jean Alexander (D-Detroit) (115 of 542)
- Rep. Helena Scott (D-Detroit) (107 of 542)
- Rep. Jewell Jones (D-Inkster) (103 of 542)
A total of 51 legislators didn't miss a single vote in 2021-22. Of that, 44 were majority Republicans and seven were minority Democrats.
Overall, the average number of Senate missed votes reached a low-water mark of .511 in 2019 and .778 in 2016 in the House.
