Bottom Five in America: Cato’s First-Ever Freedom Grades for Governors Put Dan McKee Near Dead Last, and Rhode Island Ties for Worst in the Nation on School Choice

What the report found

On Oct. 22 the libertarian Cato Institute released the 2026 edition of its “Freedom in the 50 States” index. It scores every state on 97 policy variables in 10 categories of economic and personal freedom: fiscal, housing, occupational, tech and consumer, education, speech, medicine, firearms, policing and recreation. For the first time, it also grades all 50 sitting governors on how they have moved economic and personal liberty in their states.

Rhode Island’s governor did badly. In Cato’s summary, Scott Lincicome lists the bottom-scoring governors as Massachusetts’s Maura Healey, Rhode Island’s Dan McKee, California’s Gavin Newsom, Hawaii’s Josh Green and New York’s Kathy Hochul, all Democrats. National coverage this week focused on Hochul finishing 50th, behind the governors of Hawaii, California, Rhode Island and Massachusetts.

Where Rhode Island stands out

• Education freedom: tied for last. Cato says the bottom states “typically lack school choice programs, have weak or nonexistent charter school laws, and offer few or no open-enrollment options,” and that “Maine and Rhode Island are tied for last among all 50 states” (education category).
• Occupational freedom: F, third from the bottom. Cato ranks Rhode Island behind only Delaware and Minnesota at the bottom. It says the F states have no right-to-work law, a high minimum wage, heavy licensing burdens without universal recognition of out-of-state licenses, and policies that “substantially restrict the options” for independent contractors (occupational category).
• No one aced it. Cato says no state enacted more than 75% of the pro-freedom policies it measured on either economic or personal freedom. Arizona ranks first overall; South Carolina, Alaska, Massachusetts, New York and Hawaii rank last.