The worst bills of 2021 New Mexico Legislative session (that passed)

RGF tracked all of the bills in the 2021 Legislature and rated them based on their impact on your freedoms. You can find out about those bills and how your legislators did here at our Freedom Index site.

The following are some of the very worst bills that passed the 2021 New Mexico Legislature

SB 42: increases taxpayer contributions to the Education Retirement Board (ERB) with no additional input from employees. The bill also fails to make the fund solvent;

SB 317: Among other issues this bill increases taxes on certain health insurance policies from 1 percent to 3.75 percent. The legislation represents a tax hike of $153.2 million annually initially;

HB 20: Mandatory paid sick leave (government employees were ultimately not included);

SB 112: Sustainable economy task force: creates a task force with the express goal of reducing reliance on oil and gas. Of course, New Mexico’s Democrat-controlled Legislature has had ample time to enact public policies to “diversify” New Mexico’s economy;

SB8: Gives local governments the ability to enact more restrictive air quality regulations than are imposed by the federal government;

HJR 1 Increases withdrawals from New Mexico’s Land Grant Permanent Fund by 1.25% increase and dedicates 60% for “early childhood” programs/40% for K-12;

SB 84: Community Solar: Further reduces reliability of electrical grid by providing special incentives for solar providers;

HB 2: The New Mexico budget increases spending by an already-bloated State government and provides already-well-compensated and economically-stable State employees with pay raises;

HB 4: The so-called New Mexico Civil Rights Act would actually do little to protect New Mexicans’ civil rights and instead simply opens local governments throughout the State up to more litigation.