New York Rep. Mike Lawler is touting his latest high score for bipartisan work in Congress as he gears up for a tough re-election battle in one of the country's most competitive House districts.
The Rockland County Republican ranked near the top of the House's 435 members in a fairly new measure that aims to distinguish its "bridgers" from its "dividers," based on how often they sponsor bills with members of the other party and other factors. Lawler and two other members were tied for sixth with a 99.2 score in the Bridge Grades project.
Lawler has earned previous high marks for bipartisanship and effectiveness, and he often promotes them to burnish his reputation as a moderate. He greeted his new score as fresh validation he can work across the aisle
and get results, saying voters sent him to Congress "to solve problems and to be an effective legislator for the folks I represent."
"I’m honored to receive this recognition, and I’ll continue putting the interests of New York’s 17th District ahead of arbitrary political games," Lawler said in a statement.
Inside Mike Lawler's bipartisan grade
The Bridge Grades were calculated based on bills and public statements from the last year and a half. The scoring system was first developed in 2024 through a project that is meant to encourage cross-party collaboration in Congress and is funded by the Mediators Foundation, a Colorado-based nonprofit.
Lawler has represented New York's 17th Congressional District since 2023 and is waging a high-profile re-election run against Democrat Cait Conley, an Army combat veteran and formal national security official. Their race for Lawler's coveted swing seat in the Hudson Valley is viewed as a toss-up. The outcome will help decide which party controls the House for President Donald Trump's last two years in office.
Conley's campaign scoffed at Lawler's new score as an irrelevant measure that ignores his voting record. Campaign spokeswoman Maddy Rosen noted that Lawler was found to have voted with Trump 100% of the time in another congressional measure, and highlighted his votes in support of Trump's "Big Beautiful Bill," his tariffs and war against Iran — all partisan matters that have sharply split Republicans and Democrats.
"Of course a career political operative like Mike can game this rigged system well," Rosen said of the Bridge Grades score in a statement. "But Hudson Valley voters aren’t fooled, and come November, they’ll send Cait Conley to Congress."
The figure on his Trump-aligned votes came from an analysis by VoteHub, a nonpartisan group that crunches political data. The study found Lawler sided with Trump in all 282 floor votes in 2025 on which the president had taken a clear position. Lawler wasn't unique in that regard; he was one of 182 out of 219 House Republicans who voted 100% with Trump in that study.
Lawler ranked fourth in the House for bipartisan bills in 2023 — his first year in office — in a longstanding annual ranking of Congress by The Lugar Center and Georgetown University that appears to have ended after that report.
A different report card released in 2025 that graded Congress members on effective legislating placed Lawler sixth among House Republicans and first among House freshmen in his first term. That was based on the House passing seven of Lawler's 58 bills, two of which were later signed into law on their own or as part of larger legislation.
The highest score in the new Bridge Grades report went to Jimmy Panetta, a California Democrat who scored a 99.7. Other New Yorkers besides Lawler in the upper ranks were Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis of Staten Island (99.0); and Democratic Long Island Reps. Tom Suozzi (97.8) and Laura Gillen (96.5).
Chris McKenna covers government and politics for The Journal News and USA TODAY Network. Reach him at CMcKenna@usatodayco.com.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Mike Lawler ranks near top in House in new scores for bipartisan work
