Voter anger drove Republican wins in Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania
Voter anger drove Republican wins in Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania
Resounding victories by Republicans across Pennsylvania at the federal and state levels in Tuesday’s election can be summed up in one reason: voter anger.
Voters were angry over an economy that has left them paying more for housing, groceries and gasoline and upset over an immigration policy that saw border crossings reach a record high last year, political analysts and others told Armchair Lehigh Valley.
As historically has been the case, voters laid the blame at the party in control of the White House, said Christopher Borick, director of Muhlenberg College’s Institute for Public Opinion.
As President Joe Biden’s vice president, Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, became the target of their ire.
“You begin and end with the public mood and political cycles,” he said in an interview Wednesday. “This year, it totally benefited the Republicans.”
Berwood Yost, the director of the Institute for Public Policy at Franklin & Marshall College, said it’s not surprising that the anger trickled down to other races.
“In a time of significant polarization, it would be unusual if there was a significant divergence in party preferences down ballot,” he said in an email.
Tuesday’s election saw former President Donald Trump win Pennsylvania with 50.70% of the vote versus Harris’ 48.35%, according to unofficial state figures. Pennsylvania’s 19 Electoral College votes helped the Republican win 292 electoral votes – 22 more than needed to win the election.
While the U.S. Senate race between incumbent Democrat Bob Casey Jr. and Republican David McCormick, who holds a slight lead, is too close to call, Republicans took all three statewide offices – Dave Sunday won as attorney general; reelected were Tim DeFoor as auditor general and Stacy Garrity as state treasurer.
In a stunning upset, state Rep. Ryan Mackenzie denied incumbent Democrat Susan Wild a fourth term in the 7th Congressional District, defeating her 50.7% to 49.3%.
Republican Ryan Mackenzie unseats incumbent U.S. Rep. Susan Wild in 7th District
Republicans picked up at least one other Congressional seat as well – in the 8th, where Democrat Matt Cartwright (49.02%) lost to Republican Rob Bresnahan Jr. (50.98%). The control of the House is still undecided while the U.S. Senate has flipped to the Republicans.
Four incumbent Lehigh Valley House Republicans – Joe Emrick (137th), Milou Mackenzie (131st), Ann Flood (138th) and Zach Mako (183rd) – sailed to victories over their Democratic challengers.
Emrick’s win came even as his Democratic challenger Anna Thomas amassed more than $1 million in cash donations and received more than $570,000 worth of in-kind contributions to take him on.
In the 187th, Republican Gary Day, who lost his seat in a 2022 primary, recaptured his seat.
Control of the state House, where Democrats hold a narrow majority, was still undecided while Republicans were expected to hold onto the state Senate.
Night of wins for Lehigh Valley Republicans in state House races
Polling foretold voter anger over inflation, which peaked at 9.1% in June 2022 but has since dropped, reaching its lowest point of 2.4% in September. The economy emerged as the No. 1 issue even as The Wall Street Journal said the next president “will inherit a remarkable economy.”
Borick said the high costs of housing, gas and food hit home with voters.
“We see it, we feel it. Locally, that’s important,” he said.
Immigration also ranked high on the list. Borick said the Biden administration made an “unforced error” in allowing border crossings in Mexico to reach a record monthly high in December. He said the feeling that crossings needed to be stemmed cut through the partisan divide.
Borick said Republican gains in voter registration reflected the mood of the voters and translated into votes at the polls. In Pennsylvania, the GOP saw its rolls leap by 211,336 voters – more than twice as that of the Democrats.
GOP registers twice as many voters as Democrats in Pennsylvania, Lehigh Valley
With his 3,346,902 tally, Trump captured 130,130 more votes than Harris, the latest unofficial figures in Pennsylvania show. He also bested his vote tally from 2020 by 59,031 votes. Conversely, Harris got 180,752 fewer votes than Biden did in 2020.
As a candidate, Borick said Harris “overall ran a really good campaign,” but said “she was facing a real headwind.”
This time around the funding and ground game advantage that Harris and other Democrats enjoyed didn’t work out, Borick said.
That was apparent in the 7th Congressional District race, where Wild raised $8.1 million and spent $7.5 million, according to the latest FEC data. Mackenzie, since his hard-fought, victorious three-way April 23 primary, raised about $1 million and spent about $800,000.
“A lot of people had counted this campaign out: We were dramatically outspent, behind in the public polls, discounted by a lot of pundits, and far behind in the forecasts,” Arnaud Armstrong, Mackenzie’s campaign spokesperson, said in an email Wednesday.
Armstrong said Mackenzie ran a lean operation with experienced staffers who could replicate the work of big consulting firms.
“We also knew the district well — everyone on our team had been through the GOP losses in the Lehigh Valley in recent years and we learned the lessons. The end result is that we had a nimble, scrappy campaign that managed to punch way above its weight.”
Glenn Geissinger, chair of the Northampton County Republican Committee, said Republican candidates were unified in supporting each other.
“In 2024. Donald Trump was running as a former president and running on a record,” Geissinger said. “He realized it was imperative to have Republicans in office at all levels, and his message was getting shared and getting out to everyone.”
That effort led Trump to win Northampton County with 88,171 votes (50.63%) versus 84,291 for Harris’ (48.40%). In 2020, Biden eked out a win there with 85,087 (49.78%) versus 83,854 for Trump (49.05%). Thus Trump gained 4,317 votes over 2020 in the county.
Lori McFarland, chair of the Lehigh County Democratic Committee, said her fellow party members are “catatonic and numb” over their defeats.
Democrats had 100,000 local and outside volunteers on the ground promoting candidates in the Lehigh Valley. “I am very proud of all the volunteers,” she said.
McFarland conceded that the economy weighed heavily on people’s minds, but said other factors came into play as well.
She believes Harris’ shortened candidacy – she entered the race in July after Biden dropped out – gave little time to get her message across.
She also thinks racism and misogyny led people to choose Trump over Harris.
Despite the Republican victories, Yost said the results still show a country divided.
“I think it is also important to put this into context. President Trump's overall victory does not represent a landslide either in the electoral college or in the popular vote, Yost said.
“His likely electoral vote count will probably be similar to Biden's in 2020 and far below electoral college landslides in ’80, ’84 or even ’08. Second, incumbent parties have lost elections in many countries over the past few years, which I think shows a kind of post-COVID dissatisfaction with governance that transcends borders.”
Neither of the Lehigh Valley’s three state senators – Democrats Lisa Boscola (18th) and Nick Miller (14th) and Republican Jarrett Coleman (16th) – were up for reelection. Incumbent Democrats Joshua Siegel (22nd); Mike Schossberg (132nd); Jeanne McNeill (133rd); Peter Schweyer (134th); Steve Samuelson (135th), and Robert Freeman (136th) were unchallenged in their state House reelection bids.