The McCormick-Casey PA match-up lining up to be the biggest Senate race in 2024
Salena Zito
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PITTSBURGH — David McCormick’s entrance to the U.S. Senate race this week sets the stage for what has the potential to be one of next year’s most important, bombastic and expensive Senate races in the country.
The Republican businessman, who narrowly lost last year’s primary race to celebrity surgeon Mehmet Oz, will make his announcement at the John Heinz History Center here in Pittsburgh on Thursday. With no other candidates in line to jump in a Republican primary, it is a move that in all likelihood will pit him against Sen. Bob Casey, the incumbent Democrat from Scranton who announced earlier this year he is seeking a fourth term.
A MCCORMICK RUN WOULD GIVE GOP AN MARQUEE CANDIDATE
Muhlenberg College political science professor Chris Borick said two things stand out about McCormick’ entrance in the race. First, unlike last year’s food fight of a GOP primary, the state party and the base has coalesced around McCormick pretty quickly. Second, in doing so (and again unlike last year), they have coalesced around a candidate who is the most electable.
“Those decisions are very intertwined with each other,” Borick said, adding, “If this remains the case that McCormick receives the full-throated endorsement of the state party, then Republican leaders in Pennsylvania looked at the dynamics of the 2022 Senate primary and recognized it wasn’t a healthy situation if you’re looking to win general elections in the state.”
Borick said last year’s divided and volatile 2022 primary field, which included McCormick, businessman Jeff Bartos, insurgent conservative activist Kathy Barnett, and Oz — whose endorsement by former President Trump turned nasty against McCormick in the closing days of the primary — clearly taught the state party a lesson.
Sally Geyser, the chairwoman of the Elk County Republican Party, was one of those Republicans who said she learned that lesson. She said she is ready to sign on the dotted line to support McCormick.
“I’ve been asked, would I support endorsing a candidate for the Senate? I said, ‘If it’s Dave McCormick, I will completely 100% support endorsing Dave McCormick, get behind him, and try to get this done,’” Geyser said.
Geyser said she is well aware that the Casey campaign will try to paint McCormick as someone who isn’t from here. “Well they want to do that because it was successful with Fetterman trolling Oz, that is not going to work with McCormick: He has history here,” she said.
Geyser said she also expects them to ding McCormick for becoming rich in his career. “He was smart enough to make his money. Well, I respect that. I respect that you became rich, and even super rich, because you had an idea, you went for it, or you worked for it. You work for it. I’m okay with that,” she said.
In suburban Johnstown, Jackie Kulback, the chair of the Cambria County Republican Party and the Southwest Caucus chair, supported Bartos in last years primary, but said she is all in with McCormick as well.
“Candidate quality matters,” she said. “Let’s face it, you cannot win with a subpar candidate in a state like Pennsylvania. There’s a finite amount of resources available and it’s important to not waste money and tie on a contentious primary, Dave McCormick has the resume and resources to win and that the recipe to defeat Casey,” she said.
Borick said the fragmented field and the acrimony within the race didn’t lead to an outcome that helped the Republican Party last November, “And I think there was immediate hope and efforts to not come up with the repeat.”
By repeat, he meant the unwanted result of Oz ultimately losing to John Fetterman, even thought the latter was visibly recovering from the effects of a stroke.
Borick said almost from the day he conceded in 2022, McCormick was seen as someone that the party can largely get behind.
“There was fear again that someone like Doug Mastriano might muddy the works, but I think as much as leaders can help clear a field in contemporary times, there was a desire to do that and efforts to get behind a candidate that they think is much more electable in a general election in the state.”
Mastriano, last years GOP gubernatorial candidate and current state senator, announced earlier this summer he would not be entering the Pennsylvania primary for the U.S. Senate.
Borick said a match-up between McCormick and Casey will be one for the ages and unlike any previous races Casey has had since defeating Republican incumbent senator Rick Santorum by a crushing 18 percentage points in 2006.
“Beginning in 2006 Casey has had two things on his side, the legacy attached with his name — his father was a popular governor, — and luck, every cycle he has run in as been a very, very good year for Democrats,” Borick said.
The 2006 midterms were devastating for Republicans, reminds Borick, “But so were the 2018 midterms, and in 2012 he was running the same year Barack Obama was seeking reelection,” said Borick.
Borick said Casey has been a candidate who has traditionally matched up with the Pennsylvania general electorate well, “However like many Democrats, he’s had to shift with his party over time and has a record that will allow the Republican Party and the Republican nominee to categorize him as moving left over the years and abandoning his more centrist image,” he said.
Of McCormick, Borick said if you look at his military service, his engagement in terms of economic policies and beliefs, he too makes him a good fit for the state.
“I think a pretty good traditional fit for Republicans in the state, his challenge will be the populists within his party,” he explained.
Casey and McCormick share little in common. Casey has been in elected office for over 27 years, first as state auditor general for two terms, then as state treasurer before winning his first race for senate in 2006.
McCormick, a West Point grad who was part of the first wave of U.S. troops sent into Iraq during the Gulf War in 1991, eventually entered the world of business in Pittsburgh, initially as a consultant, then as the president of the software company FreeMarkets. He left Pittsburgh the mid 2000’s to join the G.W. Bush administration at Treasury, then went into the finance world at Bridgewater.
Borick said they do share one thing in common though, namely losing a race in their party’s primary. McCormick lost by under 1,000 votes last year to Oz and Casey suffered a humbling loss to the former Philadelphia mayor Ed Rendell in the 2002 gubernatorial primary by a staggering 12 percentage points.
Borick said the question in a McCormick matchup with Casey if Trump and Biden are at the top of the ticket is: “Would McCormick hang on to the Trump voters that were coming out for Trump in 2024? The answer is most likely.”
“ A lot of folks aren’t going to break in that group for Bob Casey over McCormick. [The latter] might gain some of the more traditional Republicans, suburban Philadelphia Republicans that he’s a more natural fit with, and maybe take some of those and split some tickets,” he said.
“If those voters can’t or won’t vote for Trump, they might be able to vote for Dave McCormick,” he said, adding, “I think could I see a scenario in 2024 where Trump would lose narrowly in Pennsylvania and Dave McCormick perhaps win. Yeah, could see something like that.”
“While that is getting way ahead of ourselves, it is something that could happen,” said Borick
Borick said to expect a McCormick-Casey race not only to be politically turbulent,but also very expensive. Last year’s Senate race here was the Keystone State’s most expensive, at an astonishing $420 million in total, according totracking done by OpenSecrets.
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Borick said when it comes to Pennsylvania next year, everyone likely needs to buckle up their seat belts.
“This has all the potential to be the most interesting race in the country,” he said. “Casey has for the first time attracted a marquee challenger in McCormick in a state the country will already have their eyes on for the presidential election. Look for both races here to be decision makers.”