Report card grades Walker as liberal

Two conservative political groups say GOP Gov. Olene Walker is not making the grade: She's too liberal.

But GrassRoots and Accountability Utah, whose leaders are well-known Republican conservatives who have butted heads with the Utah Republican Party hierarchy before, like House Speaker Marty Stephens.

He gets relatively good grades from both groups.

"He is in the Top 20 group of legislators in our report," says Don Guymon, editor of the 2004 GrassRoots legislative report card.

Walker gets only a 33 percent ranking from GrassRoots, well below the averages of the House and Senate. She gets a dismal -45 percent ranking from Accountability Utah.

Said Walker spokeswoman Amanda Covington: "First of all, Gov. Walker has an 81 percent approval rating (in a Deseret Morning News/KSL-TV, Dan Jones & Associates poll). And that says a lot about Utahns' belief that she's the right governor and doing a good job.

"She's co-authored the Utah Republican Party platform. She doesn't say she believes in it, she wrote it. She served on the national (party) platform committee for individual rights. So the Walker record speaks for itself."

The rankings by the two conservative groups — while only the opinion of the groups' leaders — is one yardstick on the conservative/liberal scale of at least three of the GOP gubernatorial candidates who have legislative voting records.

Since 1992, GrassRoots has issued an annual report card ranking each of the Legislature's 104 lawmakers and the governor by their action taken on a dozen or so bills during the most recent session. Among the 29 bills GrassRoots selected this year were those on child welfare, gun control, abortion, tuition tax credits and having the United States withdraw from the United Nations.

Accountability Utah got into the ranking game only in the last several years.

Walker, who is running for governor this year from the GOP middle, has been criticized by conservatives on her vetoes and other actions. She's openly appealed to public educators for support in the May 8 state GOP convention, where delegates will vote on all eight gubernatorial candidates.

Stephens, R-Farr West, is also running for governor, as is state Sen. Parley Hellewell, R-Orem.