- If ‘No Vote Recorded’ were a person, they would look a whole lot like Asm. Freddie Rodriguez. In the last seven Courage Score evaluations, he hasn’t moved past a 53%, losing more points annually on cowardly avoidance than on voting his objectionable policy principles. And while he raised his score from 25% to 39% in 2024, an F is still an F in our book. This year, he looked the other way on 35 critical progressive bills, including AB 1042 to require that pre-treated seeds be marked with the pesticides they’ve been exposed to, AB 1840 to require that housing loans not be withheld based solely on an individual’s immigration status, and AB 1889 to require that municipalities consider local wildlife when greenlighting development projects.
- You might be wondering if this brand of moderate politics is what the voters of AD-53 were hoping for when they elected Asm. Rodriguez, but that’s not what the numbers tell us. AD-53 has an electorate with a significant 21% Democratic registration advantage, and in 2014 and 2016 they supported Prop 47 and Prop 57, respectively, which were statewide initiatives to establish more effective and humane criminal justice reforms to reduce mass incarceration. In 2018, they supported Prop 1 and Prop 2 to increase affordable housing availability and homeless support initiatives. So why was Asm. Rodriguez looking the other way on progressive criminal justice and housing bills through his final year in the Assembly? We can’t be sure, but his real estate and law enforcement donors may have had more influence than the Californians he represented.
Freddie Rodriguez
State assembly
Chair of Emergency Management Committee
F
District
AD-53
Party
democrat
Score
39
Votes
Corporate Money
| Type | Amount | |
|---|---|---|
| Real Estate | $148,450 | Sources |
| Oil & Gas | $136,500 | Sources |
| Cops | $139,252 | Sources |
| Health Insurance | $47,400 | Sources |