Results and Summary

This year’s index is a modernized version of the report we have published periodically for the past decade. This new edition includes several variables not included in prior editions and removes some that are less relevant to today’s state policy debates. It pares down the number of categories and aligns them more closely with policy reforms being considered in the states. It also changes the way the scores are calculated. We believe these improvements will make the index more transparent and more valuable to policymakers, members of the public, and journalists covering public policy. Detailed descriptions of each category and variable analyzed are included in their respective sections.

In addition, while Cato has long published a separate report card grading governors only on tax and budget policies, it did so in ways that were often incompatible with the state rankings in “Freedom in the 50 States.” This redesigned “Freedom in the 50 States” merges the two reports into one, integrates both rankings, applies a consistent methodology, and assesses the record of all sitting US governors on a much broader range of freedoms.

Both the states and governors are graded on 97 policy variables spread across and grouped into 10 topic categories. (The scoring methodology is detailed in the Methodology.) For each of the 10 topic categories examined, each state and governor is first awarded a percentage score based on how well they did on the individual metrics, then a freedom score based on that percentage, and then a letter grade based on that freedom score:

• Percentage score. The average score of all the policy variables within a topic category yields a raw percentage score from 0 percent to 100 percent. If, for example, a category has 10 variables but a state has enacted a pro-freedom policy in only 5 of them, it receives a 50 percent raw score for that category.
• Freedom score. A state/​governor raw score is then curved on a scale of 0–10 for its freedom score, with 10 being assigned to the highest percentage score in a particular category and 0 being the lowest. As such, a freedom score of 10 does not necessarily mean a state/​governor scored 100 percent in a topic category; they simply had the best score among all participants.
• Letter grade. Letter grades are based on a state/governor’s freedom score for each category. Grades are assigned based on the freedom score achieved and are awarded on a curve. The highest score will always earn an A, as will scores above an 8.9, while a score of 2.5 or less earns an F, with other grades spread roughly equally between these thresholds. Letter grades are intended to improve readers’ understanding of freedom scores.

Once these scores are tabulated and grades assigned, the topic categories are grouped into a parent category, either Economic Freedom or Personal Freedom. Scores and grades are assigned in the same way as they are to these component topic categories, with all categories equally weighted. Finally, the overall grade for a state is assigned based on a weighted average of the Economic Freedom score and the Personal Freedom score.

Governors’ grades are a bit different. The state freedom grades are this index’s foundational element. Yet a governor of a high-scoring state receives the benefit of simply inheriting a freedom-oriented policy environment (or vice versa). To account for this reality, the governors are graded based on the direction they have personally moved the state—often in cooperation with the legislature but sometimes not (e.g., when the legislature overturns a governor’s veto). The bills a governor signed that increased the freedom score of the state above what it would have been otherwise give the governor extra credit, as these actions added to the state’s numeric freedom score. Conversely, a governor who vetoed a bill that would have increased a state’s freedom or who officially proposed something that would or did decrease the state’s freedom relative to the status quo (i.e., the policy as it existed before they were governor) has points deducted. The technical aspects of the scoring system and its overall methodology are also available in the Methodology.

Finally, the list of freedoms included in this index is not intended to be comprehensive. We will be updating the index every two years, and more policy measures will be added in future editions.

The overall scores and grades are based on a combination of the Economic Freedom and Personal Freedom scores and grades.

Economic Freedom Grades

The Economic Freedom grades are based on an average of the scores in the following categories (in alphabetical order), each of which is described in its respective section:

Fiscal Burden

Housing Freedom

Occupational Freedom

Tech and Consumer Freedom

Personal Freedom Grades

The Personal Freedom grades are based on an average of the scores in the following categories (in alphabetical order), each of which is described in its respective section:

Education Freedom

Firearm Freedom

Freedom from Law Enforcement Overreach

Freedom of Speech and Association

Medical Freedom

Recreational Freedom

The top score and grade go to Arizona, which receives an A. Arizona is one of the top five freest states in 5 of 10 categories in this index (Education Freedom, Firearm Freedom, Fiscal Burden, Medical Freedom, and Tech and Consumer Freedom). It ranks first in overall Personal Freedom. Arizona is most notable for its leadership on education freedom. Its score of 95 percent in this category means that it earns nearly perfect scores on every policy measure in that category (private school choice, open enrollment, charter school laws, and homeschooling regulation), and it earns one of the highest marks of any state in any category. The centerpiece of Arizona’s education policy is a generous universal-eligibility education savings account, enacted on the heels of a successful tuition tax credit program that started in 1997 and remains active today. Arizona also has the broadest form of public school open enrollment, a best-in-the-nation charter school law, and very light regulation of homeschooling.

That said, even Arizona has room for improvement. It ranks 42nd among all states in Freedom from Law Enforcement Overreach, earning a letter grade of D. This is owed to the state’s uniformly poor scores across almost every variable in the category, most notably on its lack of protections against civil forfeiture, its expansive allowance for police to use a qualified immunity defense against civil lawsuits, its proliferation of traffic and surveillance cameras, and laws that give substantial discretion to law enforcement and the judiciary to decide whether a parent has endangered their child for letting them walk to school or the store, play outside, or spend a short time at home without an adult.

The runner-up is Montana, with a grade of B. Montana is one of the top five freest states in three categories (Firearm Freedom, Freedom from Law Enforcement Overreach, and Housing Freedom). It ranks second in Personal Freedom and has a strong Housing Freedom score, thanks to its substantial housing policy reform efforts over the past three years. These housing reforms include one of the strongest protections for homeowners to add an accessory dwelling unit (ADU) to a single-family home property, some of the best caps on local minimum parking mandates, parity in the laws for manufactured housing relative to site-built housing, relatively low minimum lot sizes across the state, and a state law that bans rent control at the local level.

Like Arizona, Montana could improve its freedom score in several areas. Most notable is its D grade on Recreational Freedom, which is owed to two factors: a cartelized liquor retail market that restricts private entry into liquor sales and, although recreational cannabis use is legal in the state, some of the lowest felony possession thresholds in the country.

• Third place: Nevada. Nevada’s strong showing in Personal Freedom (third place and a grade of A) overshadows its average Economic Freedom ranking (14th place for a C grade). The strong Personal Freedom score reflects the strength of Nevada’s first-place finish in Recreational Freedom. Where the state falls flat is in Housing Freedom: Although the state does have a relatively limited statewide law on ADUs, its lower score results from the presence of multiple restrictions on duplexes and triplexes in residential areas and mixed-use zones as well as the proliferation of mandatory parking minimums.
• Fourth place: Florida. Florida ranks second among the states on Education Freedom (for its robust school programs) and Fiscal Burden (mainly due to its current ability to balance the absence of an income tax, minimal government spending, and manageable debt levels). The categories in which it scores the worst are Freedom of Speech and Association and Freedom from Law Enforcement Overreach. The former is due to the state’s relatively weak protections for political and public speech, and the latter is due to its broad restrictions on the liability of police officers in civil damages cases and to its requirement that local police departments allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to deputize police officers for immigration enforcement purposes.
• Fifth place: Idaho. Idaho receives a perfect score on Firearm Freedom and scores highly in the Housing Freedom and Occupational Freedom categories (in which the state ranks first and second, respectively). The housing reform law that the state passed is, alongside Montana’s, considered a model for other states. Its key features are a strong ADU law, a starter home law that lowers the minimum lot sizes for new homes of this sort to under one-tenth of an acre, and a manufactured home reform that puts that type of structure on equal footing with site-built homes.

No state in this index earns a raw percentage score of 100 percent in any of the categories other than Firearm Freedom. In fact, neither top-scoring Arizona nor Montana receives more than 75 percent overall or more than 75 percent on Economic Freedom or Personal Freedom. As such, even the freest states in the country could significantly improve their support for and protection of Americans’ freedoms. Low-scoring states, of course, have even more room for improvement.

Economic Freedom Governor Grades

Personal Freedom Governor Grades

The top-scoring governor is Greg Gianforte (R) of Montana. He is the only governor to earn an A overall. He ranks within the top five governors in five categories (Firearm Freedom, Fiscal Burden, Housing Freedom, Medical Freedom, and Tech and Consumer Freedom). His strongest score comes from pushing housing reforms in his state. He also earns high marks for expanding medical freedom by signing into law a repeal of the state’s “certificate of need” laws for almost all health services and facilities in the state and for making permanent the telehealth expansions for both patients and practitioners that were first enacted on a temporary basis in 2020 in response to the spread of COVID-19. In the Tech and Consumer Freedom category, Gianforte receives credit for signing into law a unique “freedom to compute” law that establishes a statutory right to own and use computing technologies, including artificial intelligence, and appends to government restrictions on that right a legal standard resembling strict constitutional scrutiny—the same standard that applies to First Amendment rights.

The governor with the second-highest score is Jared Polis (D) of Colorado, who earns the highest B grade. He scores in the top five of three categories: Freedom from Law Enforcement Overreach, Medical Freedom, and Tech and Consumer Freedom. He is the top-scoring governor in Medical Freedom for his expansion of the state’s medical marijuana program that, on net, made the product more accessible for a wider range of medical conditions. He also expanded telehealth options for in-state patients to receive care from out-of-state practitioners. His tech policy achievement comes not from signing bills but from vetoing those that would have lowered his state’s Tech and Consumer Freedom score. Some of these bills would have rolled back the permissive regulation of autonomous vehicles in the state, while others he vetoed on First Amendment grounds would have restricted social media access more than the narrower rules he eventually signed into law. Polis’s other top scores come from his approach to reducing law enforcement overreach by narrowing the ability of police officers to use the qualified immunity defense for civil claims against them filed in state courts. He also was one of a handful of governors who restricted the enforcement of federal immigration law by state and local police, requiring terminations of detention contracts that the state had entered into with ICE.

It should be noted that neither governor receives more than 65 percent in either their overall score, their Economic Freedom score, or their Personal Freedom score.

• Third place: Ron DeSantis (R) of Florida. The governor of Florida excelled at expanding education freedom in his state and at maintaining fiscal discipline. In most other categories, DeSantis benefits from maintaining the generally pro-liberty posture of his state. In fact, his scores in these areas are high enough to overcome his very poor performance in Freedom of Speech and Association: He receives an F in this category due to his executive orders favoring the rights of his preferred political perspectives, perverting the strong campus free speech protections signed by his predecessor. Meanwhile, he tended to strongly favor policies that encourage overreach by law enforcement, such as requiring local police forces to effectively become immigration detainment agents. These items all overwhelm the positive score DeSantis receives for his order to remove Flock cameras from state highway rights-of-way.
• Fourth place: Greg Abbott (R) of Texas. Governor Abbott’s grade is mostly the result of maintaining his state’s generally pro-freedom status, particularly in the Economic Freedom category. Abbott himself ranks among the top five in three categories: first in Firearm Freedom and Tech and Consumer Freedom, and fifth in Housing Freedom. A high point on his housing record comes from signing into law a starter home law that allows new homes to be built on smaller lots. But his Tech and Consumer Freedom record isn’t all rosy: The bill he signed that created an AI regulatory sandbox (for which he receives credit) also restricted AI tools and online content (for which he receives a deduction). His worst scores by far are in the Freedom of Speech and Association category due to his narrowing of protections for public speech and his signing into law a substantial weakening of free speech on college campuses. In the Recreational Freedom category, he receives deductions for signing into law a categorical prohibition of cannabinoid vapes, including nonintoxicating CBD vapes; these deductions were offset by his veto of a bill that would have dramatically restricted hemp use more generally.
• Fifth place: Kim Reynolds (R) of Iowa. Governor Reynolds pulls into fifth position for being a strong champion of school choice in her state. Her persistence yielded success in all aspects of education freedom. Thanks to her, the state now has a robust education savings account program, broader charter school options, between-district open enrollment, and expanded tuition tax credits. Her grade benefits from Iowa’s top rank in Freedom of Speech and Association to begin with. But her lowest score appears in the Recreational Freedom category, in which she receives deductions for substantially restricting the types of hemp-derived THC products available to adults.

The author wishes to thank the invaluable contributions of Yasmeen Kallash-Kyler and Tom Ryan throughout the course of this project. Additional thanks also go the Cato Institute interns who helped along the way: Cece Coleman, Taalya Khan, Brigham Jamison, and Adriana Soto.