Common Ground Committee Press Release More Progress Less Division

Scorecard Updates Rankings of Politicians’ Success Seeking Common Ground on Issues That Matter to Voters

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Common Ground Committee updates its voter assistance tool, which scores politicians on working across the aisle.

WATERTOWN, MA – Common Ground Committee, Inc (CGC), a nonpartisan, citizen-led organization devoted to improving public discourse in politics, recently updated its Common Ground Scorecard. The average score for members of the House, Senate, and State governors increased to 31/110 from 28/110. Common Ground Committee designed the Scorecard as a tool for Americans. It is intended to show which lawmakers are most committed to working across the aisle in solving the issues that matter to their constituents. They can see how those representatives have performed in finding common ground and making bipartisan progress.

“Legislation requires cooperation just to get out of committees in Congress and be considered for a vote. That means partisanship gets in the way of finding solutions to the significant issues facing our nation,” said Erik Olsen, co-founder and CEO of Common Ground Committee. “We are delighted that since we launched the Scorecard in 2020, the average score has increased 25% from 25 to 31 points. This small increase is a sign we are moving in the right direction, but there is still a long way to go. We hope that Americans will use the Scorecard to assess their lawmakers’ performance on seeking common ground when deciding whom to vote for, and will push their representatives to continue moving towards a more collaborative culture.”

The highest-profile politicians, including the President and Vice President, Members of the United States Congress, and state governors, have been scored. Notable scores are as follows:

Key Political Figures:

  • President Joe Biden, 30/110 (no change since 2023)
  • Vice President Kamala Harris, 20/110 (no change since 2023)
  • House Speaker Mike Johnson, 40/110 (no change since 2023)
  • House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, 52/110 (up from 50/110)
  • Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, 30/110 (no change since 2023)
  • Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, 32/110 (no change since 2023)

Highest Scores Nationwide:

  • Representative Don Davis (NC-1), 110/110
  • Representative Don Bacon (NE-2), 110/110
  • Senator Maggie Hassan (NH), 110/110
  • Representative Susie Lee (NV-3), 110/110
  • Senator Jacky Rosen (NV), 106/110
  • Representative Young Kim (CA-40), 104/110
  • Representative Gus Bilirakis (FL-12), 101/110
  • Representative David Trone (MD-6), 100/110
  • Representative Mike Lawler (NY-17), 100/110
  • Representative Brian Fitzpatrick (PA-1), 100/110

Most significant improvement since April 2024:

  • Up 83: Representative Mike Lawler (NY-17) 100/110
  • Up 77: Representative Eric Sorensen (IL-17) 84/110
  • Up 68: Representative Brittany Pettersen (CO-7) 85/110
  • Up 63: Senator Jacky Rosen (NV) 106/110
  • Up 60: Representative Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (WA-3) 77/110
  • Up 59: Representative Andrea Salinas (OR-6) 66/110
  • Up 54: Representative Thomas Suozzi (NY-3) 54/110
  • Up 52: Representative Nancy Mace (SC-1) 82/110
  • Up 52: Representative Mikie Sherrill (NJ-11) 78/110
  • Up 52: Representative Zach Nunn (IA-3) 69/110
  • Up 50: Representative Hillary Scholten (MI-3) 57/110
  • Up 47: Representative Jen Kiggans (VA-2) 54/110
  • Up 42: Representative Chrissy Houlahan (PA-6) 83/110
  • Up 41: Representative Maria Salazar (FL-27) 67/110
  • Up 40: Representative Matt Cartwright (PA-8) 71/110
  • Up 38: Representative Emilia Sykes (OH-13) 55/110
  • Up 36: Representative Wiley Nickel (NC-13) 53/110
  • Up 34: Representative Tim Burchett (TN-2) 41/110
  • Up 30: Senator Maggie Hassan (NH) 110/110
  • Up 30: Representative Ted Lieu (CA-36) 36/110
  • Up 30: Senator Tom Cotton (AR) 30/110
  • Up 29: Senator John Hickenlooper (CO) 63/110
  • Up 29: Representative Jay Obernolte (CA-23) 49/110
  • Up 29: Representative John Moolenaar (MI-2) 39/110
  • Up 28: Representative Blake Moore (UT-1) 63/110
  • Up 28: Representative Veronica Escobar (TX-16) 30/110
  • Up 26: Representative Chris Deluzio (PA-17) 43/110
  • Up 25: Representative Don Davis (NC-1) 110/110
  • Up 24: Representative Susie Lee (NV-3) 110/110
  • Up 24: Representative Brad Schneider (IL-10) 86/110
  • Up 23: Representative Marc Molinaro (NY-19) 40/110
  • Up 22: Representative Jimmy Panetta (CA-19) 86/110
  • Up 21: Representative Young Kim (CA-40) 104/110
  • Up 21: Representative William Timmons (SC-4) 83/110
  • Up 21: Representative Juan Ciscomani (AZ-6) 38/110
  • Up 20: Representative Debbie Dingell (MI-6) 92/110
  • Up 20: Representative Doug LaMalfa (CA-1) 53/110
  • Up 20: Representative Dan Sullivan (AK) 37/110
  • Up 20: Representative Nancy Pelosi (CA-11) 20/110
  • Up 20: Representative Ruben Gallego (AZ-3) 18/110

This video provides a short walkthrough of the Scorecard and how to use it. A summary of the highest and lowest scorers can be found here.

Common Ground Committee does not endorse political candidates. The organization’s only goal in providing the Common Ground Scorecard is to provide Americans with an objective, up-to-date, and easy-to-understand tool to discover how likely their elected officials or candidates for public office are to work with the opposite party to find common ground.

Using the Common Ground Scorecard, Americans can search for public officials by name, state, or office held. They can also search using their zip code to get a list of all the officials representing them. The scorecard is the first-ever model to assess the degree to which elected public officials and candidates for office seek points of agreement on social and political issues through listening and productive conversation, ranking politicians up to a maximum of 110 points, using aggregated data from many sources including the Lugar Index, GovTrack, the Bipartisan Policy Center, and others. Additional points can be earned via commitments to finding common ground in the future (which 23 lawmakers have made) or deducted for personal demonizing.

For interview requests, please get in touch with Penelope Walker at penelope.walker@commongroundcommittee.org or (339) 293-2180.

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About Common Ground Committee
Common Ground Committee (CGC) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit 501(c)(3) citizen-led organization dedicated to bringing healing to the national challenges of polarization and unhealthy political discourse. Since its founding in 2009, CGC has held 21 public forums featuring panelists reaching over 250 points of consensus. Panelists have included such notable pairings as John Kerry and Condoleezza Rice, Chris Murphy and Will Hurd, David Petraeus, and Susan Rice, Michael Steele and Donna Brazile, Chris Wallace and Maggie Haberman, and Larry Kudlow and Barney Frank, exploring issues ranging from race and income inequality to foreign policy. CGC produces the Let’s Find Common Ground podcast series, with over 575,000 downloads and over 280,000 subscribers. CGC also created the Common Ground Scorecard, a voting tool that scores politicians and candidates for public office on their likelihood of finding common ground with the opposite party. Free of political agenda and financial influence, CGC focuses on bringing light, not heat, to public discourse.