Pennsylvania

Gubernatorial

Pennsylvania was one of the most hotly contested states in a number of races during the 2020 cycle. Joe Biden won the state by a small margin, and so did two statewide Republicans. The top performer, however, was from Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who won by just under five points. Shapiro would ascend to the governor's mansion two years later, and appoint his own replacement

Allegheny County (home to Pittsburgh) is one of the counties that Democrats in Pennsylvania get a lot of their margins from. Prior to Josh Shapiro's 2022 run for governor, he won Allegheny in his bid for re-election to the Attorney General's office by over 28 points. Many of the outer suburbs that Trump won Shapiro also carried

Beaver County is near Pittsburgh, and has a mix of ancestral Democrats and Democrats that flipped due to the re-alignment. Shapiro only lost the county by about 4 points, but would go on to win it 2 years later. His main areas of strength were Aliquippa and Beaver Falls

Berks is the largest swingy county that Shapiro lost in 2020. He did well in the Reading area and a few small towns (Hamburg and Kutztown), but got blown out in most of the rurals and small-mid-sized communities

Bucks County has been a perpetually Democratic-leaning (but downballot Republican) Presidentially since 1992. Josh Shapiro won it in 2020 by just under 5 points, with its distinct four sections (red/blue/red/blue) being observable

Centre County is my favorite-shaped county in the state. It has historically been something of a swing county, and Josh Shapiro only won it by about 3 points in 2020. His large margins out of the State College area were what moved the county into his column

Crawford County sits across lake Pymatuning from my uncle's campground. It is one of the most conservative counties in the state, and Shapiro lost it by well over 30 points. The only region of Democratic strength was Meadville, and even then the strength is not overwhelming

Now-Senator John Fetterman said many times that as Erie County goes, so goes Pennsylvania. Josh Shapiro won Erie County in 2020, and won Pennsylvania, though he carried Erie by a larger margin than the state at large. Erie, its surrounding townships, and Edinboro locked it down for him

Lackawanna County is home to The Office, Joe Biden, and the Casey political family, and is historically one of the most reliably blue in Pennsylvania. Shapiro won it by over 20 points in 2020, mainly along the more densely populated strip between Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, only doing especially poorly in the southern portion of the county

The Lehigh Valley is possibly the most competitive region in Pennsylvania, and the most important to win in statewide races. It consists of Lehigh and Northampton counties, and voted for Josh Shapiro in 2020 by just over 6 points. He performed the best in the major urban centers of Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton, and did the worst along the region's northern border in places like Bangor and Slatington

Luzerne County was a formerly reliably blue county in Northeastern PA. Trump won it in both of his runs to date, but Shapiro managed to win it by 274 votes at the same time Trump carried it. His margins in the corridor did the most to shift the county into the blue column

Schuylkill County used to be the prominent feature of a Democratic-pack gerrymander, but these days, its a solidly red county. Despite a 5-point statewide win, Shapiro lost the county by almost 30 points. He only carried a handful of precincts in and around Pottsville

Westmoreland County is one of the larger suburban counties surrounding Pittsburgh. Shapiro over-performed here, but this was still a 17-point loss. He did the best in Greensburg, Monessen, and New Kensington

The old PA 14 was the archtypical ancestrally Democratic district. While Shapiro did well here compared to the average Democrat, he lost it by just under 15 points. He did best along the river, in union dominant small towns, and areas with higher minority populations 

Presidential

A formerly Democratic-leaning seat that Democrats are looking to hold in 2022 is PA-08 in the northeast of the state, which was President Biden's home district before his family moved to Delaware. The seat went for Trump by 3 points in 2020, with Democrats carrying the Lackawanna and Monroe County portions of the seat, and losing the other 3. Long term, however, the trends for them do not look good, given that Obama would have carried the district by double digits in both of his runs

One of the most competitive State Senate races in 2024 will be the 37th Senate district, which may decide control of Pennsylvania's State Senate. In 2020, Trump narrowly won this outer-Alleghany County seat by just over a point. Parts of this seat originally propelled Connor Lamb to office. Biden is slightly favored to flip the seat, but it will be extremely competitive in electing its Senator

A big miss for Pennsylvania Democrats in 2022 was failing to flip SD 40. This was a seat that Trump won by less than half a point, and that John Fetterman carried. This seat contrains quickly left-trending territory paired with right-trending territory, so even in a good year for either party, it would be firmly a tossup. Not winning this seat likely cost Democrats Pennsylavnia's State Senate in 2024