Zero. That’s the number of votes missed in 2019 by state Representatives Beth Griffin, Brad Paquette, Pauline Wendzel, and Mary Whiteford along with area state Senators Kim LaSata and Aric Nesbitt. The Mackinac Center for Public Policy’s MichiganVotes.org tracks the voting record of all members of the state House and Senate, and says 2019 was a record year for the fewest number of votes that were missed with 768 between the two chambers. That’s down sharply from when the website was launched and 21,162 votes were missed by lawmakers in the 2001-2002 session.
This year, just one state senator and three House members missed more than 50 votes in 2019, compared to nine senators and three representatives who exceeded that level in 2018. Fifty-one votes were missed by Democratic Senator Adam Hollier of Detroit due to military duty in the Army Reserve, while Representative Larry Inman’s 124 missed votes were the highest in the House. He missed those while being kept out of the Capitol between the time he was indicted and later acquitted in federal court of lying to the FBI. Jurors were unable to reach a verdict on charges of attempted extortion and soliciting a bribe.
