27 senators are up for reelection—which, if any, are 'progressive' relative to the political lean of their states?
Over the past three decades, Democratic Party voters have shifted more to the left than voters in the Republican Party have to the right, according to a report by the Brookings Institution. Gallup Poll data shows that since 1994, the share of Democratic voters self-identifying as "liberal" has more than doubled, growing from 25% to 54%, a new high, in 2023. The ongoing ideological transitioning of the party's voters has compelled many traditionally moderate Democrats to embrace progressive talking points and entrenched the influence of the progressive bloc within the Democratic party.
Stacker used data from Progressive Punch to see how progressive the 27 senators running for reelection in 2024 are relative to the Democratic or Republican leanings of their home states. Thirty-four Senate seats are up for election in 2024 and seven senators have announced their retirement, are seeking a different office, or are otherwise not running for reelection.
Twelve senators—from Elizabeth Warren to Sherrod Brown—are used as a "progressive control group" to measure against Republican Party positions as a whole. Their voting patterns form a "progressive position," and the rating methodology identifies any ideological vote in which a majority of this 12-member bloc opposed a majority of Republicans as "overall progressive."
The rating also relies on each legislator's percentage of "lifetime crucial votes," in which the progressives were on the losing side, but the margin was narrow enough that a few differently cast Democratic votes could have altered the outcome. In other words, this metric represents the "where were you when we needed you" roll call votes for each assessed legislator. In situations where Democrats control a legislative body, such as the U.S. Senate for 2023-24, all close votes and votes where the progressive side lost are classified as crucial.
The rating also considers the political leanings of each state to assess each legislator's progressiveness accurately. The "state tilt" represents a likely outcome of an open-seat race in the absence of any significant scandal. There are five tilt categories: Strong Republican, Leaning Republican, Swing, Leaning Democratic, and Strong Democratic. Each category has a threshold percentage of lifetime crucial votes and an associated grade to classify a senator as progressive. The thresholds are as follows:
Strong Democratic: 83.33 (B)
Leaning Democratic: 80.00 (B-)
Swing: 76.67 (C+)
Leaning Republican: 73.33 (C)
Strong Republican: 70.00 (C-)
