states

Rhode Island has an ISLT score of 16, which means it has a low risk of a Republican-led state legislature passing legislation to swing the state’s 2024 electoral votes toward the Republican presidential nominee. 

Rhode Island’s margin of victory in the last presidential contest was 20.8%, making it the 34th closest contest. The margin of victory in the state matters because states with the closest margins of victories are more likely to flip as a result of voter suppression bills and other tactics that could be unleashed by a rogue, unaccountable state legislature. 

Currently, the state legislature is controlled by the Democratic Party. The partisan control of the state legislature is included because Republican operatives supported and carried out an insurrectionist coup to undermine democracy in the last election, and have demonstrated a desire to overturn democratic election outcomes if necessary in order to gain power. Republicans control 12.0% of the Connecticut House and 13.2% of the Connecticut Senate, which indicates that Republicans do not have a majority to enact future legislation that could interfere with the 2024 election. We also compared the partisan control of the state legislature to the state’s 2020 presidential results, and found that Republicans do not control more state legislative seats than expected. 

Rhode Island’s legislature introduced at least 9 bills during 2021 and 2022 that would suppress votes or interfere with election administration.

Additional Considerations

Governor

Voters in Rhode Island recently re-elected Governor McKee (D). Generally, the Rhode Island legislature is reliably Democratic. However, under a maximalist version of ISLT, Governor McKee (D) would not be able to act as a check on statutes related to federal elections through a gubernatorial veto. State legislatures could enact radical changes without the governor’s approval — circumventing the usual process required for bills to become law.

State Supreme Court

Under a maximalist version of ISLT, the state Supreme Court would be unable to review or strike down any federal election-related changes the state legislature enacted. State legislatures could enact radical changes without state courts or the state constitution checking their authoritarian power. For this reason, the Conference of Chief Justices — which represents chief justices of both parties in all 50 states, took the rare step of filing an amicus brief opposing ISLT.

Redistricting

ISLT could drastically reshape the redistricting process for U.S. House seats, enabling radical state legislatures to gerrymander with impunity. Currently, Rhode Island uses an advisory commission that gives input into the congressional reapportionment process.⁴ If the Supreme Court adopts ISLT, the state legislature could choose to take full control of the redistricting process for U.S. House elections and strip the advisory commission of its authority.

¹ 2020 presidential election data sourced from “2020 Presidential Election Results” Interactive Map, New York Times.
² 2022 midterm election data sourced from “Rhode Island Election Results 2022 Midterms,” The New York Times and “Rhode Island House of Representatives elections, 2022,” Ballotpedia.
³ State legislation data sourced from “Comprehensive Bill Tracker,” Voting Rights Lab (accessed Nov. 7, 2022).
⁴ “Rhode Island State Summary,” All About Redistricting/ Loyola Law School.