https://soundcloud.com/capimpactca/the-2019-california-legislative-session-by-the-numbers

With the 2019 legislative session now concluded, let’s take a look at the most recent session by the numbers. Given the Democratic supermajorities in both houses of the California Legislature and the shift from Governor Jerry Brown to Governor Gavin Newsom, I’ll also compare this session to the 2017-18 legislative session.

Let’s start with the number of bills introduced:

	2019	2018	2017-18 Session Total
Assembly Bills	1,833	1,531	3,264
Senate Bills	792	694	1,511
Total	2,625	2,225	4,775

 

Moving on from the number of bills introduced, we can compare the number of bills signed into law and the number of bills vetoed by the two Governors.

 

Number of Bills Signed into Law (Percentage of Bills Introduced Signed into Law)

	2019	2017-18 Session Total
Assembly Bills	574 (22%)	1,228 (37.5%)
Senate Bills	296 (11%)	647 (43%)
Total	870 (33%)	1,875 (39%)

 

Number of Bills Vetoed (Percentage of Bills Introduced Vetoed)

	2019	2017-18 Session Total
Assembly Bills	122 (5%)	86 (2%)
Senate Bills	50 (2%)	233 (5%)
Total	172 (6.5%)	319 (7%)

 

We can now move from a macro view of the sessions to a more micro view of the session. Let’s start by looking at the Senators who authored the most bills in 2019. It was:

1. Cathleen Galgiani (27)
2. Ben Hueso (26)
3. (tie) Bob Hertzberg, Jim Nielsen, Anthony Portantino (25)
4. (tie) Bill Dodd, Henry Stern, Scott Weiner (24)

In the 2017-18 Session, the most prolific bill authors in the State Senate were:

1. Jerry Hill (48)
2. Ricardo Lara (35)
3. (tie) Cathleen Galgiani, Steve Glazer, Ed Hernandez, Connie Leyva, John Moorlach, Janet Nguyen, Richard Pan, Anthony Portantino, Jeff Stone, and Scott Weiner (40)
4. (tie) Ben Allen, Steven Bradford, Hannah-Beth Jackson, Nancy Skinner, Henry Stern (39)

In the lower house, the Assemblymembers who authored the most bills in 2019 were:

1. Jim Frazier (36)
2. Autumn Burke (32)
3. Lorena Gonzalez-Fletcher (31)
4. (tie) Rob Bonta, Wendy Carrillo, Marc Levine, Evan Low (30)
5. Jacqui Irwin, Randy Voepel (28)

In the 2017-18 session, the most prolific bill authors in California’s lower house were led by Assemblymember Phil Ting at 102, due to all of the budget related measures that he carries. Behind him were:

1. (tie) Richard Bloom, Rob Bonta, Autumn Burke, Eduardo Garcia, Lorena Gonzalez-Fletcher, Marc Levine, Blanca Rubio (50, the maximum number of bills allowed)
2. (tie) Joaquin Arambula, Anna Caballero, Monique Limon, Evan Low, Bill Quirk, Miguel Santiago, Jim Wood (49)
3. (tie) Mike Gipson, Jacqui Irwin, and Patrick O’Donnell (48)

Lastly, we’ll look at the number of bill referrals to committees based on original committee referrals. On the Senate side in 2019, the top committees were:

1. Education (167)
2. Health (150)
3. Public Safety (149)
4. Judiciary (123)
5. Governance and Finance (120)

In the Assembly for this past session:

1. Public Safety (217)
2. Health (202)
3. (tie) Education and Transportation (138)
4. Natural Resources (124)

Looking at the session before last, the Senate committees with most original bill referrals were:

1. Education (313)
2. Public Safety (288)
3. Transportation and Housing (237)
4. Health (226)
5. Governance and Finance (223)

In the Assembly:

1. Public Safety (384)
2. Health (300)
3. Education (260)
4. Judiciary (247)
5. Transportation (233)

You can find a full transcript of today’s podcast here.