Specter Isn’t Progressive Enough For PA

While the Democratic caucus cheers Arlen Specter’s party switch, progressives will have to wait and see if his votes will change as well.

Aside from his votes for SCHIP in January, Barack Obama’s economic recovery act in February, and the Supplemental Appropriations Act in March, Senator Specter has regularly sided with the conservatives so far in 2009. He voted: for amending the estate tax to benefit the rich, against cap-and-trade to combat global warming; for extending the Alternative Minimum Tax “patch” to 2014 (putting off tax reform); and for a range of tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy.

In 2008, Senator Specter had a 45 percent voting record on the Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) scorecard [1]. That’s better than all other Senate Republicans except the two from Maine, Collins (75 percent) and Snowe (80 percent). But Specter’s ADA score was substantially worse than all the Democrats. Senator Landrieu had the worst Democratic ADA score (65 percent). Evan Bayh received a 70 percent score; Blanche Lincoln scored 80 percent.

Similarly, Senator Specter received the third-lowest Republican score on the American Conservative Union (ACU) 2008 scorecard [2]. Specter received a rating of 42 percent; Snowe was rated at 12 percent; Collins at 20 percent. But again, the ACU considered Specter’s record substantially more conservative than any Democrat. The closest was Mary Landrieu at 32 percent. Evan Bayh scored 29 percent; Blanche Lincoln got a score of just 8 percent.

So Arlen Specter will have to move quite a distance to the left just to fit into the “Bayh caucus.”

At the same time, Pennsylvania deserves better. Pennsylvania has voted for the Democrat for President in every election since 1992. The state’s other U.S. Senator, Robert Casey, is far to Specter’s left. The governor has been a Democrat since 2003, and the state House went Democratic in 2006. Today, Democrats have a significant registration edge, 4.4 million to the GOP's 3.2 million.

If Arlen Specter changes the way he votes, we can all rejoice. But right now, he’s too conservative for the Democratic caucus in the U.S. Senate and too conservative for the state of Pennsylvania.