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Decade’s Top 10 Legislators For Missing Votes: 9 Represented Detroit

Site that tracks state representative and senator yeas and nays also shows not present

Nine of the 10 Michigan state legislators who missed the most roll call votes in the past decade were Democrats who represented the city of Detroit.

That’s according to the voting record database accumulated by MichiganVotes.org, a service of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.

State Sen. Bert Johnson missed the most votes for the decade that began in 2010 and ends on Dec. 31, 2019. He was absent for 805 of the 6,338 roll call votes that took place while he was in office. Johnson served as a member of the state Senate from 2011 through 2018 and before that in the state House from 2007 to 2011.

The decade’s second-highest missed votes total belonged to Bettie Cook Scott. She missed 613 votes out of a possible 1,554. Scott was a state senator from 2007 to 2010 and then served in the House of Representatives in 2017 and 2018.

The only politician on the top 10 list who did not represent Detroit citizens was also the only Republican. Former state Sen. Michael Green is a Republican from Maryville who served in the House of Representatives from 1995 through 2000 and then in the Senate from 2011 through 2018. Green missed 262 out of a possible 6,624 votes, putting him ninth on the list.

Here are the other state legislators who made the 10-year top ten list for missed votes:

No. 3: Morris Hood III was a state representative from 2003 through 2008 and a state senator from 2011 to 2018. He missed 553 out of 6,624 votes.

No. 4: John Olumba was a state representative from 2011 through 2014. He was not present for 544 out of 2,862 votes.

No. 5: Jimmy Womack is a state representative who entered office in 2009. Womack missed 504 out of 2,150 votes.

No. 6: Coleman Young II was a member of the House of Representatives from 2007 to 2010 and then served in the Senate from 2011 through 2018. Young missed 413 out of 7,257 votes.

No. 7: Rose Mary Robinson was a state representative from 2013 through 2018. She missed 350 out of 4,160 votes.

No. 8 Virgil Smith Jr. served as a state representative from 2003 through 2008 and then was a state senator from 2011 to 2016. He was absent for 281 out of 4,310 votes.

No. 10: Shanelle Jackson was a state representative from 2007 through 2012. She missed 275 out of 2,150 votes.

Michigan Capitol Confidential is the news source produced by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. Michigan Capitol Confidential reports with a free-market news perspective.