Can Democrats Prevail in Pennsylvania in ’26?
“Trump is Trump, and he’s going to be Trump.”
Sam Talarico learned this iron law of American politics in 2024. The pinwheel ballyhoo that would derail an ordinary politician somehow works in the president’s favor. In 2024, the chair of the Erie County Democrats watched Trump escape assassination, drive a garbage truck, work a McDonald’s Drive-Thru, and host massive rallies that spawned a 75% turnout in the nation’s preeminent swing county. The president’s narrow, yet decisive, victory in Erie mirrored the returns in Pennsylvania and nationwide. “Trump is Trump” is shorthand for a charismatic president’s ability to defy political gravity. The 2026 midterms will put this iron law to the test in Erie – and beyond.
The stakes in Pennsylvania could not be higher. At the state level, Josh Shapiro, the popular Democratic incumbent governor, faces Stacy Garrity, the GOP state treasurer. Democrats, meanwhile, hold a bare 1-seat majority in the statehouse. The GOP, meanwhile, hold a four-seat edge in the upper chamber.
Eugene DePasquale, chair of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party, told me, “Shapiro is in a strong position to open the door and slip in some state legislative seats. Keep the house and flip the senate.” Nationally, a quartet of Keystone State races could flip the House and make Hakeem Jeffries Speaker. The Cook Political Report terms the race for two Republican seats, the 7th in the Lehigh Valley and the 10th in Harrisburg, a “toss-up.” Another two seats, the 8th in Scranton and the 10th in Harrisburg and York, are rated “lean” or “likely” Republican. Added to this, a Shapiro landslide could make him a frontrunner for the White House. Talarico thinks all things are possible. As he views it, “I would think he would … try to run it up. And, boy, if he could flip the [state] Senate and he could really do some things.”
Pennsylvania Republicans have seen this movie before. The Democratic Wile E. Coyotes corner the Republican Roadrunner, only to see Trump escape and “beep, beep” down the road with a nod and a wink. Democrats remember this feature film from 2016 and, especially, its 2024 sequel. Matt Knoedler thinks 2026 could be part of a trilogy. The communications director for U.S. Rep. Mike Kelly believes GOP policies, especially tax reform, could change the equation.“I think there’s going to be some momentum for Mike [Kelly] and for other Republican incumbents,” said Knoedler.
Brian Shank sees it, too. The former chair of the Erie County Council credits Democratic hyperbole for driving GOP turnout. “Whatever Trump does they [Democrats] hate … It seems to me this is kind of where Trump is very smart politically. It helps Republicans when Democrats talk about impeaching Trump or all they can talk about is ‘Trump is terrible,’” said Shank.
“Trump is terrible,” did not especially work for Democrats in 2024. Lindsey Scott, the chair of the Crawford County Democrats, told me “issues” in 2025 were the key to “moving moderates, independents, and nonpartisans firmly into our column.”
Whether Democrats have the issues is debatable, but history is on their side. Since the Civil War, the president’s party has lost congressional seats in 38 of 41 midterms. When it comes to state races, the history is gauzier. State and local politics once regularly diverged from national partisan trends. Richard Nixon’s 1972 landslide, for example, only brought one governor’s mansion from the Democratic column. By 1994, American politics had nationalized. Bill Clinton’s struggles turned into a Republican congressional landslide that translated into gains in 33 of 41 state legislatures and flipping 10 governor’s mansions. In Obama’s two midterms, the same equation meant Republicans flipped 15 Senate and 76 House seats along with 13 gubernatorial offices and 948 state legislative seats.
For Ron Brownstein, the political physics of a nationalized politics begins and ends with a president’s approval rating. But the veteran political journalist acknowledges that in recent elections, Trump has “repealed the laws of political gravity.” Trump’s polling and the political zeitgeist seem separated from election results. But Brownstein believes the 2025 Democratic landslide “reasserted all of those traditional guideposts.” Talarico sees a new day for Democrats.
“I think we’re in a good position right now,” said Brownstein. And that position begins and ends with Trump’s approval rating. In Pennsylvania, according to Civiqs data, Trump’s approval is 42%, which mirrors RealClearPolitics’ average of his approval at 42.8%. According to a recent CNN poll, nearly 9 in 10 Republicans approve of the president’s performance, though Trump’s 2024 coalition included many independents and Democrats. Internal GOP polling shows shaky support from these moderate, independent, and minority voters.
Mike Ruzzi thinks the laws of political gravity might apply in 2026. Frustrated Pennsylvanians regularly call and email the veteran Erie News Now anchor with a similar refrain, “They can’t afford gas, can’t afford food, energy prices, those are the still the main issues for them.” Across western Pennsylvania, these disaffected voters turned to Trump because they, in Ruzzi’s words, believed he stood for the “little guy.” The extraordinary bond between Trump and his voters are what helped him defy political physics in 2016 and 2024. But what Ruzzi heard from voters in the 2025 election was, “You had a shot. It is not happening. We’re going to plan B.” Kristin Soltis Anderson sees that Trump voters are pleased on a series of issues, except the economy. The Republican pollster reports that “what used to be his strong suit is now a weak spot.”
Melanie Brewer, who is Rep. Kelly’s district director, believes, “The policies are what usually combat the narrative.” Lindsey Scott agrees. She thinks meat-and-potato economics can make Democrats a viable “Plan B.” In 2025, she told me that Crawford County Democrats “r[a]n on affordable housing and trying to build off the downtown. And invest in our municipal structures.” This resonated in Meadville, where 70% of residents rent. Democrats swept every city council seat. Running on issues, as opposed to personality, not only worked in Crawford County’s local elections but in Shapiro’s 2022 governor’s race. Crawford County is a Republican bastion. In 2024, Trump took it 69-30. Overwhelming GOP margins in rural counties is how Trump resists political gravity. But in 2022, Shapiro earned 39% of the Crawford County vote. That ten-point swing in Crawford County, a feat he replicated throughout rural western Pennsylvania, was the difference between a tight race and a landslide 56-41 victory.
Scott shared how Shapiro uses “issues” to woo a slice of Crawford County Republicans. She told me, “He [Shapiro] just breathes competency” without the “elite nerdism” that befalls so many other Democrats. Ruzzi seconds this. He told me, “The last time he [Shapiro] was in Erie, he was talking about future plans for the Bayfront. He knows the key for us [in Erie] is the Bayfront. In every Pennsylvania town, he knows what’s most important to that group.” Taking a page from Trump, Shapiro also hits the road. Trump mashes in rural, small-town Pennsylvania, because he rallies supporters in Johnstown, Butler, and locales that Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris would not deign to visit. Scott observed, “He’s always doing something and traveling the whole state, almost like he’s perpetually campaigning, except for he’s kind of governing on the road.” Trump delights rally-goers with a mesmerizing political carnival that is equal parts fun and policy. In this, Shapiro is no match. But his focus on issues and barnstorming appeals to a subset of the GOP. Scott shared about these Republicans: “If they find out Shapiro is coming to town, my phone is blowing up because they love him.”
Shapiro is stealing Trump’s tactics because the president proved old political laws no longer applied. Talarico found that something as basic as door-to-door voter registration has changed. He told me, “People don’t answer their doors anymore.” Voters are also wary of the time-worn mailers and poll-driven political ads. Brewer sees this. She told me, “I don't want 32 mailers that just repeat the national narrative. I don't want four different benchmark polls that cost $150,00.”
Kelly, a 7-term incumbent, wins by a consistent focus on constituent service and as Brewer shared, “We just campaign differently … I think that that with Mike Kelly, what you see is what you get. And he’s a straight shooter.”
What you see is what you get has worked for Kelly and Trump in Pennsylvania. But Republicans are not complacent. Shank, along with Cliff Smathers, the new chair of the Erie County GOP, both point to pushing Republican mail-in ballots. Two-thirds of mail-in ballot requests are by Democrats. By election day, Democrats hold a huge lead that is only surmounted by a massive GOP turnout. Smathers told me Erie Republicans made some progress in 2025. “We had a real good turnout with the mail ballots, and a lot of people didn't notice, but we increased our low propensity voters. By about 1,000 in mail in ballot this last year.”
In Erie County, Shank points to “a lot of positive, good change on the horizon.” In addition to an area Turning Points chapter, Scott Presler, a national Republican activist, has hired a full-time staffer to coordinate northwest Pennsylvania. Those moves, along with some historic numbers, should keep Democrats from spiking the football. In January 2018, ten months before Democrats took the House, they led Republicans in the generic ballot by 7-points. Today, that lead is just 4. Despite rougher economic seas and controversies over Greenland and Venezuela, the president’s approval rating is 3 points higher than it was in 2018. Then there is voter registration. Nationally, Republicans are beating Democrats in registering party faithful. In 2016, registered Democrats in Pennsylvania outnumbered Republicans by nearly 1 million. Today, the GOP has that lead down to 63,000.
Talarico’s truism that, “Trump is Trump, and he’s going to be Trump” is correct. That reality cuts both ways. Democrats are jazzed to turnout for the midterm. But the Roadrunner eludes Wiley E. Coyote because it sees things that others miss. The old rules of politics have changed. Approval ratings matter. Campaigns matter. But as Brewer explained, “I think what used to work 20 years ago, being able to say the thing that you think voters want to hear and to make big promises without delivering, people are onto that. And Trump totally blew that up in ‘16. Nobody, only Trump, really understood that.”
Trump defies the laws of political gravity because he rewrote them. The question is whether Democrats have learned the lesson.
