Mike Lawler, the House member for New York's 17th District, voted for a Medicaid work requirement that reaches the expansion coverage held by 77,687 of New York's 116,380 Medicaid adults with opioid use disorder in 2021, as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
In July 2025 Lawler voted for the final law, after his deciding vote for the House bill that May; its work rule carves out people in a treatment program, along with those who have a substance use disorder or a mental disorder deemed disabling, and the federal rule carrying it out sets how states check them. His deciding votes for the 2025 budget resolution told the committee over Medicaid to produce at least $880 billion in savings, and KFF warns the resulting squeeze on states puts recent treatment gains at risk.
Mike Lawler's Votes on Medicaid Coverage for Mental Health and Addiction Care
- People With Mental Illness or Addiction Face Medicaid Work Hours Unless an Exemption Fits, Under the Law Lawler Voted For. Mike Lawler voted yes on July 3, 2025 as the final One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed 218 to 214, after his vote helped carry the first House version 215 to 214 that May. Under the law's work requirement, a person with a substance use disorder is exempt, as is one "with a disabling mental disorder," and the rule falls on expansion Medicaid, which KFF calls "the primary coverage pathway for people with mental health or substance use disorders." Since the exemption names only "disabling" mental disorders, a person whose illness is not judged disabling has to log hours unless another of the law's exemptions applies, and the Commonwealth Fund cautions that many who lose coverage "will remain eligible for Medicaid but who did not successfully complete the paperwork."
- Treatment Gains Are Harder to Sustain Under the $880 Billion Medicaid Committee Target Lawler's Deciding Votes Set, in 2025. Lawler cast a yes vote for H.Con.Res. 14 when it was adopted 217 to 215 on February 25, 2025, and another for its final version, adopted 216 to 214 on April 10, 2025; had he alone switched, either result would have been a tie, and a tie fails. It ordered the committee that writes Medicaid law to "reduce the deficit by not less than $880,000,000,000." KFF warned that the law's cuts and "a more tenuous fiscal climate for states may make those gains harder to sustain," meaning the mental health and addiction care that states have built up through Medicaid.
What Mike Lawler's Medicaid Votes Mean for New Yorkers in Treatment
- Two in three New York Medicaid adults with opioid use disorder were covered through the expansion the work rule reaches. KFF data show that in 2021, 116,380 adults in New York's Medicaid program had been diagnosed with opioid use disorder; 77,687 of them, 67%, got coverage through the expansion, the group the work requirement applies to; a lapse in coverage can interrupt the treatment that keeps a person in recovery.
- 49,900 expansion adults in Lawler's district fall under the work rule by 2027. In New York's 17th District, 49,900 people were enrolled in Medicaid through the expansion in 2025, KFF counts; under the federal rule states must start the work requirement "no later than January 1, 2027," and anyone in recovery who falls outside the exemptions will have to document hours.
Frequently Asked Questions About Mike Lawler on Mental health and addiction
What is Mike Lawler's record on addiction and mental health under Trump?
On mental health and addiction care, Mike Lawler voted in May and July 2025 for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and the Medicaid work rule in it reaches the expansion coverage that is the main source of insurance for people with mental illness or addiction. A substance use disorder counts as an exemption, as does a mental disorder judged disabling, and the Commonwealth Fund expects paperwork to cost some who qualify their coverage anyway. Lawler also cast deciding votes for the budget resolution that told the Medicaid committee to find at least $880 billion in savings.
Are people in addiction treatment in the Hudson Valley exempt from the Medicaid work requirement Mike Lawler voted for?
Some are: the law Mike Lawler voted for exempts anyone "participating in a drug addiction or alcoholic treatment and rehabilitation program" and anyone the state finds medically frail, a category that includes a substance use disorder, and the law tells the state to confirm them using information it already holds where possible. The Commonwealth Fund expects many people who still qualify to lose coverage because of the paperwork.
Could Hudson Valley residents in recovery lose access to opioid treatment because of Mike Lawler's vote?
Mike Lawler voted for Medicaid cuts in a program that pays for "over half (56%) of those receiving medication" for opioid use disorder nationally, KFF found. In New York, 51,008 Medicaid adults received medication for opioid use disorder in 2021, and 35,147 of them, 69%, were covered through the expansion group that the work requirement reaches by January 1, 2027.
Last updated: 2026-10-27