Bill Richardson, 1947-2023

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

79% : [...]Under President Bill Clinton, Mr. Richardson was ambassador to the United Nations, succeeding Madeleine Albright in early 1997, and then secretary of energy, beginning in August 1998.
65% :Before his election in 2002 as governor, Richardson was the U.S. envoy to the United Nations and energy secretary under President Bill Clinton and served 14 years as a congressman representing northern New Mexico.
52% : Other accomplishments as governor included $50,000-a-year minimum salaries for the most qualified teachers in New Mexico, an increase in the state minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.50 an hour, pre-kindergarten programs for 4-year-olds, renewable energy requirements for utilities and financing for large infrastructure projects, including a commercial spaceport in southern New Mexico and a $400 million commuter rail system.
46% : He flew to Moscow for a meeting with Russian government officials in the months before the release last year of Marine veteran Trevor Reed in a prisoner swap and also worked on the cases of Brittney Griner, the WNBA star freed by Moscow last year, and Michael White, a Navy veteran freed by Iran in 2020.
43% : He called it the "most difficult decision in my political life" because he previously had supported capital punishment.
41% : As governor, Richardson signed legislation in 2009 that repealed the death penalty.
29% : Associated Press, "Bill Richardson, a former governor and UN ambassador who worked to free detained Americans, dies"Bill Richardson, a two-term Democratic governor of New Mexico and an American ambassador to the United Nations who also worked for years to secure the release of Americans detained by foreign adversaries, has died.

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