Michael Lawler

Republican Rep. Mike Lawler is pressing his Democratic challenger Cait Conley to start debating him months before the election in an unusual move for an incumbent as a tough race looms for his battleground House district.

Candidates typically don't square off until the campaign's final weeks, when voters are most interested and likely to tune in, and Lawler's earliest TV debate in 2024 was on Oct. 16. But he's pushing this time for a very early start, demanding six televised encounters with Conley and staging the first one in July — three months before early voting begins.

Lawler and his campaign team argue that sped-up schedule is warranted in part by the competitiveness of the race and the national media attention and vast ad spending it will draw. New York's 17th Congressional District is one of 18 House seats that are rated as "toss-ups" and that will decide which party wins control of the House in November's midterm elections — and the course of President Donald Trump's last two years in office.

"If she's as ready for prime time as she thinks she is, then she should have no reason to say 'no,'" said Chris Russell, a strategist with Lawler's campaign.

Campaign season tends to heat up after Labor Day in early September, and it's unclear if any TV stations would agree to broadcast debates as early as July. Conley, an Army veteran and former national security official who won a five-way Democratic primary on June 23, dismissed Lawler's demand as a political stunt and said she looks forward to debating him.

"If there’s one thing Mike Lawler loves to do: it’s lie to voters on TV," Conley said in a statement to the USA TODAY Network. "I look forward to our campaigns finding a time to debate and discuss the real issues facing voters. In the meantime, he can continue to pull political stunts and I'll continue hearing from folks directly in the communities I hope to serve about how Mike Lawler is failing to deliver for them."

Spotlight on NY-17 congressional race

Lawler's Hudson Valley swing district is a top priority for both parties in the looming midterm races and an especially tantalizing target for Democrats. It's one of only three Republican-held seats that Kamala Harris won in 2024, though only by half a percentage point.

Democrats see Conley as a strong prospect, adding her on July 9 to the "Red to Blue" program that promises her financial and strategic support from the House Democrats' campaign arm. Poll results released a day earlier by the Democrats' House Majority PAC showed Conley leading Lawler by six points and Lawler with a 39% favorability rating among voters.

Lawler has won his seat twice, first in a razor-thin upset in 2022 and then by a decisive 6 points in his 2024 victory over former Rep. Mondaire Jones. His campaign believes he's ahead of Conley in his current race; Russell said an internal poll before July 4 showed him up by "mid single digits," beyond the margin of error.

Lawler seeks public faceoffs with Conley

Lawler first issued his debate demand in a press release right after Conley's primary victory, arguing her campaign had rested largely on her military background and scripted lines. He pressed the challenge two weeks later, accusing Conley of repeating "canned, hyperpartisan talking points" and being "woefully short on detail and substance" in a July 7 letter to her that he released to the media.

"We have an opportunity to set a standard for transparency and substance that other high-profile campaigns around the country would be pressed to emulate," Lawler said of his debate proposal in the letter.

Conley, a West Point graduate who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and led special operations forces in her deployments, has indeed stressed that service in her campaign, and presented it as a contrast to Lawler's career in politics. Lawler was a Republican consultant and first-term state assemblyman before his election to Congress.

"Mike Lawler and I are basically the same age, we grew up like 30 miles apart, but we're very different," she said in a speech to cheering supporters after the primary, which she won by 18 points over her nearest rival. "While I was growing up here asking how can I serve my country, Mike Lawler was asking, how can I serve myself."

In the 17th District's 2024 race, Lawler and Jones waged three televised debates in the last three weeks before the election: on Oct. 16 on News12, on Oct. 23 on CBS, and on Nov. 1 on PIX11.

Part of Lawler's argument for starting sooner is that voting begins earlier than it used to and voters should know about the candidates before then. All New York voters are entitled to cast early ballots by mail, and this year that means counties can begin sending out requested ballots on Sept. 18 for the Nov. 3 general election.

"The idea of waiting until after that doesn't make sense," Russell said.