Vote descriptions here

House ratings here

The ideological splits which have characterized the Florida House since the early 2000s have largely been absent in the Senate. However, with several  moderate Republicans term limited in 2012 the fear was that the Senate would shift sharply right. However, several Republicans voted a more moderate line in the 2013 session and while partisan division were evident on issues related foreclosure, wage preemption and certain education issues, for the most part a bi-partisan consensus occurred on many issues.

As has been the case in the past, this consensus sometimes involved the Democrats moving to the middle particularly on environmental issues and tax cuts. Unlike the House Democratic Caucus which bravely fought against Governor Scott’s manufacturing tax cuts, the Senate Democrats with three exceptions (Senators Clemens, Joyner and Scott) accepted them. On environmental issues the Senate largely accepted dangerous proposals, even after they were watered down. For example on HB 999, the dangerous wetlands bill sponsored by Rep. Jimmy Patronis, no House Democrats voted no to the amended bill, the lone no vote being cast by Joe Negron. Conversely, the amended bill was still opposed by 10 Democrats upon returning to the House, almost a quarter of the caucus.

It is worth noting while several Democrats got 100 ratings in the House, only one, incoming leader Arthenia Joyner achieved that score in the Senate. Several other Democrats voted incorrectly by our standard on only one issue (more often than not the manufacturing tax cut) and achieved a 92 rating. (Senator Joe Abruzzo missed several votes so thus ended up with a 91 rating instead of a 92 as we do not count missed votes in our average.)

The full Senate ratings are below.

Abruzzo   91

Altman   0

Bean   8

Benacquisto 0

Bradley 0

Brandes 0

Braynon 92

Bullard  92

Clemens 92

Dean 31

Detert 31

Diaz De La Portilla 31

Evers 31

Flores 15

Gaetz  8

Galvano 0

Garcia 23

Gardner 0

Gibson 85

Grimsley 15

Hays  0

Hukill 8

Joyner 100

Latvala 31

Lee 0

Legg 23

Margolis 62

Montford 69

Negron 8

Richter 0

Ring 77

Sachs 85

Simmons 0

Simpson 8

Smith 77

Sobel 92

Soto 69

Stargel 0

Thompson 69

Thrasher 8