Strictness of COVID-19 policies by governor's party
Scoring state pandemic measures along the "protective policy index" reveals that Democrats on average implemented stricter policies to stop COVID-19 spread than their Republican counterparts from May through July, 2020.
This is a line graph that indexes the strictness of state-by-state COVID-19 policies on a scale of .36 to .55, in May, June and July, 2020. It shows that a governor's party affiliation can be a good predictor of pandemic policy choices. Democrats on average implemented stricter (higher numbers) policies to stop COVID-19 spread than their Republican counterparts.