RGF Releases Final “Freedom Index” scores for 2025 Legislature

The Rio Grande Foundation has finalized its legislative tracking tool called the “Freedom Index” for the 2025 legislative session. The Index is the Foundation’s effort to shine light on (and enable citizens to hold their legislators accountable) on how New Mexico legislators vote on freedom. Do they vote for lower taxes, reasonable regulations, educational choice, and constitutional liberties or do they vote for higher taxes, unnecessary regulations, the same failed education policies, and less freedom?

As is explained on the Freedom Index page on the Rio Grande Foundation’s website “We evaluate legislators by how they vote on legislation. The legislation is analyzed and scored on a scale of -8 to +8. -8 is reserved for the most liberty-depriving legislation. +8 is given for legislation considered to be among the best of advancing freedom.” Legislators are then scored based strictly on their voting record on the floor (not committee votes which are not reported publicly).

Since members of the House and Senate vote on different bills it can be difficult to compare the two.

Top performers in the House were:

202 score Randall Pettigrew (R-Hobbs)

196 score John Block (R-Alamogordo)

194 score Jonathan Henry (R-Artesia)

190 score Elaine Sena Cortez (R-Hobbs)

Top performers in the Senate were: 

62 score Jim Townsend (R-Artesia)

53 score Pat Woods (R-Broadview)

51 score Candy Ezzell (R-Roswell)

47 score Nick Paul (R-Alamogordo)

Worst Performers:

House
-214 score Andrés Romero (D-Albuquerque)

Senate
-192 score Jeff Steinborn (D-Las Cruces)