Tommy Norment Least "Family-Friendly" Republican in the General Assembly

Last week the Virginia Family Foundation released their report card for the last session of the Virginia General Assembly. The scorecard ranks legislators based on a large number of votes that the Virginia Family Foundation was tracking during the last session. Forty members of the House of Delegates received a 100% and 9 members of the State Senate received the same score. All of these members were Republican. The highest rated Democrat was Del. Joe Johnson with a 95%, an the highest rated Democrat Senator was Sen. Phil Puckett with a 92%. These were the only two Democrats to receive a score above 90%.

On the other hand, the lowest rated Republican was Sen. Tommy Norment with a 65%. If this were a grade in college, he would have scored a solid D. No either Republican in either body scored below 70%. (Del. Morgan Harvey was the second lowest Republican with a 72%.) If Tommy Norment were just a normal senator, this wouldn't be as big a deal. However, he is currently the Republican Leader in the Senate. The prospect of installing Tommy Norment as the majority leader if the Republicans take back the senate should not excite any values voters. Taking back the State Senate is only worth it if we have a pro-life chairman in charge of the Health and Education Committee in the next session. This will not happen if Tommy Norment is the majority leader. As we move forward with the senate races, values voters need to put their efforts behind senate candidates who will work to change the Republican leadership in the Senate. Unless the leadership is conservative it won't matter if we retake the majority, or even if the majority of the caucus will vote as conservatives on legislation.