About this candidate
Deborah A Fellela represents House District 43 · Johnston.
At a glance
Democratic incumbent in the 2026 candidate roster.
How to read this page
Campaign positions, election returns, campaign finance and outside scorecards are labeled by source and period.
Campaign priorities
Housing
Work with the new governor on Rhode Island's housing crisis, support development where appropriate without overburdening municipal infrastructure, and expand affordable housing for older residents and veterans.
Teacher Retirement
Continue working with teachers' unions and NEARI to reduce the combined age-and-service retirement threshold from 95 to 90.
Hospital Safe Staffing
Continue work related to a study commission on safe staffing in hospitals, with an emphasis on worker and patient safety.
Constituent and Veterans' Issues
Develop legislation in response to constituent concerns and work with the House Veterans' Affairs Committee leadership on measures addressing veterans' needs.
Reviewing Existing Laws
Review antiquated laws already on the books and consider updating them rather than assuming that additional legislation is always necessary.
Campaign response submitted directly to RIEP.
Past electoral performance
Districtwide general election results. Select a year to open RIEP’s results map.
Democratic primary history
House District 43 · Share of votes cast for named candidates.
Rhode Island Board of Elections ↗. Official 2026 results updated September 15, 2026. Earlier primary years are under construction.
Campaign finance snapshot
28-days-before-election report · 2026 · July 1, 2026 to October 5, 2026. Figures describe the stated reporting period.
The filing reports $300.00 in PAC contributions and no individual cash contributions for this reporting period.
Record in office · 2025–2026 General Assembly
Session attendance
Presence recorded in official House Journals. “Not Voting” on a floor vote is not treated as an absence. Attendance rate is a percentage.
- Leadership
- Senior Deputy Majority Leader
- Committees
- House Conduct Committee — Second Vice Chair · House Labor Committee · House Oversight Committee · House Veterans' Affairs Committee — First Vice Chair
Official committee roster · Dataset updated August 30, 2026.
Vote-based ideology
How Deborah A Fellela’s recorded votes compare with other representatives. This feature is under construction and measures voting patterns, not legislative effectiveness.
Loading voting records…
How this is calculated
One-dimensional W-NOMINATE estimates positions from 450 divided roll calls in 91 official House journals. Similar positions indicate similar voting patterns in this vote set. Party labels color the points; they are not used to estimate the positions. The positive direction is anchored to Michael Chippendale; zero is not a calibrated ideological center.
Coverage ends June 11, 2026. Named votes reconcile with printed totals in all 1,210 extracted binary roll calls. Missing votes and recusals are not counted as Nay. Annual fits are separately scaled and cannot measure ideological change directly. House and Senate coordinates are not directly comparable.
This experimental analysis is separate from CEL’s Legislative Effectiveness Score and RIEP’s Legislative Progress Index. View all representatives and methodology → · Official House journals ↗
Bills & votes
Deborah A Fellela’s 29 lead-sponsored bills in the 2025–2026 General Assembly, from RIEP’s official-source research. Passage and law status reflect the recorded snapshot; “Not recorded” does not describe the current disposition of a bill.
Lead-sponsored records · 2025–2026 29 records
| Bill | Year | Passed chamber | Became law |
|---|---|---|---|
| H5083 | 2025 | Yes | Yes |
| H5181 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H5198 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H5263 | 2025 | Yes | Not recorded |
| H5292 | 2025 | Yes | Yes |
| H5330 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H5394 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H5528 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H5559 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H5587 | 2025 | Yes | Not recorded |
| H5689 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H5728 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H6106 | 2025 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H6351 | 2025 | Yes | Yes |
| H7022 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H7145 | 2026 | Yes | Not recorded |
| H7146 | 2026 | Yes | Yes |
| H7390 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H7565 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H7609 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H7855 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H7969 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H8016 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H8023 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H8033 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H8034 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H8041 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H8277 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| H8391 | 2026 | Not recorded | Not recorded |
Source: RIEP research using Rhode Island General Assembly bill-status records, August 30, 2026 snapshot.
Outside ratings & scorecards
Each organization uses its own methodology. RIEP does not combine these into an overall candidate score.
Center for Effective Lawmaking
Historical score covering the 2023–2024 legislative session. It does not measure Deborah A Fellela’s 2025–2026 record.
The party rank compares this legislator with other members of the same party in the same chamber. CEL’s expectations label uses a separate benchmark that accounts for party status, seniority and committee leadership. “Meets Expectations” means a score between 50% and 150% of that benchmark; it does not mean an average party rank. How CEL defines expectations ↗
View full legislative effectiveness details
The score weights advancement by bill significance. The expected benchmark accounts for comparable legislators’ party status, seniority and committee leadership.
| Category | Bills introduced | Committee action | Beyond committee | Passed chamber | Became law |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Commemorative | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Substantive | 20 | 19 | 7 | 7 | 6 |
| Substantive and significant | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Historical scores
2023–2024 · 0.90 · Party rank 37 of 66
2021–2022 · 1.06 · Party rank 29 of 65
2019–2020 · 0.78 · Party rank 37 of 68
2017–2018 · 0.34 · Party rank 62 of 64
2015–2016 · 0.36 · Party rank 61 of 64
2013–2014 · 0.46 · Party rank 57 of 70
2011–2012 · 0.30 · Party rank 58 of 65
2009–2010 · 0.34 · Party rank 58 of 70
2007–2008 · 0.71 · Party rank 41 of 62
Produced by the Center for Effective Lawmaking at the University of Virginia and Vanderbilt University, not by RIEP. Source report ↗ · Methodology ↗ · Glossary ↗
Three-stage legislative progress index
View entire 2025–2026 House ranking →
Why RIEP publishes a current-session index
CEL’s Legislative Effectiveness Score is our research benchmark. The CEL data presented here cover 2023–2024 and have not been extended to the 2025–2026 session. RIEP’s provisional index provides a current-session view of bill sponsorship and advancement while that historical score remains available for context.
RIEP uses three equally weighted stages and a House average of 1. It does not reproduce CEL’s five-stage method, bill-significance weights or expected-performance model. “Above” or “below House average” describes this index only; it is not a CEL expectations label.
Compare RIEP and CEL scores for the same 2023–2024 session →Lead-sponsored bills, bills passed by the House, and bills that became law, compared with all 75 House district records. A score of 1 represents the comparison-set average.
View calculation and methodology
Each stage receives equal weight. Divide Deborah A Fellela’s count at each stage by the corresponding House total, average the three shares, and multiply by 75. Rank uses unrounded scores; equal scores share a rank. Bills that become law contribute at each stage they reach. Cosponsored bills and resolutions are excluded.
75 ÷ 3 × (29 ÷ 2469 + 7 ÷ 648 + 4 ÷ 501) = 0.763304.
House totals: 2,469 lead-sponsored bills; 648 bills passed by the House; 501 bills became law.
Dataset updated: September 22, 2026. The complete House calculation dataset includes all 75 district records, including representatives not running in 2026. These snapshot counts are not a live legislative feed.
Prototype only. This is a separate RIEP progress index, not an update to the Center for Effective Lawmaking’s score or an overall assessment of a legislator. It does not include committee-action stages or bill-significance weights. Party comparisons use the 2025–2026 House roster.
Underlying bill records: Official Rhode Island Bill Status/History ↗
This is the Rhode Island League of Cities and Towns' score, not an RIEP assessment. Denominators below nine reflect absences, recusals, or other non-votes in the League's published scorecard. Source report ↗
The ACLU selected these votes to highlight civil-liberties issues. An aligned vote matches its stated position; an opposed vote does not. The selection does not cover every relevant bill or capture committee and floor leadership, so RIEP does not convert it into an overall grade.
This is an ACLU of Rhode Island voting record, not an RIEP score or endorsement. RIEP displays the underlying organization-selected record without converting it into a percentage, grade, rank, or aggregate candidate rating. The ACLU states that its selected votes do not cover every bill with civil-liberties implications and do not capture committee or floor leadership. Source report ↗
League of Women Voters · 2026 voter guide
The supplied October 2026 South County guide covers selected Chariho-area races. This candidate is not included in that regional guide.
Endorsements
No published endorsements are currently recorded for this candidate in RIEP’s research. Additional endorsements will be added after verification.
Outside organizations’ endorsements, not RIEP endorsements. Sources may include organization lists and voter-guide records.
Under construction
Additional bill summaries, floor votes, earlier primary results and digital footprint research will be added after review.