Pennsylvania will pick our next president due to the Electoral College arithmetic. Trump held a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday and spoke there again on Monday, while Kamala Harris has repeatedly held events in Philadelphia.
The 19 Electoral College votes conferred by Pennsylvania make it the path to victory, as the largest of the toss-up states. If Trump wins the Sunbelt states where he has consistently led in the polls, then the Keystone State will live up to its nickname, putting him over the top.
Two more months remain for registering voters in Pennsylvania for this election, through October 21. Democrats with their superior ground game are feverishly signing up thousands of new voters, particularly liberal college students, but even more Pennsylvania voters are registering as Republicans
The latest data show that the gap has narrowed to a 354,000 voter registration advantage for Democrats there, compared with their 810,000 registration advantage in 2020. Then Biden reportedly won the state by only 80,000 votes as many Democrats crossed party lines to vote for Trump there, plus Independents.
Biden’s roots in Pennsylvania gave him an edge there in 2020, compared with Hillary Clinton in 2016, and Kamala Harris lacks that local advantage. Biden carried multiple eastern Pennsylvania counties, including the one where he grew up, but Trump can win those counties now that Biden has been booted off the ticket.
The hero’s welcome given by the Democratic National Convention to Biden late Monday night sought to mollify Pennsylvania voters miffed at the mistreatment of their favored son. Adding insult to injury, Democrats snubbed Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro by picking Leftist Tim Walz from Minnesota as their VP nominee.
All this creates a tremendous opportunity for conservatives, Republican candidates, and everyone who cares about our country to urge the millions of unregistered Pennsylvania voters to sign up online so they will be able to vote. Pennsylvania makes it easy for a resident to check his registration status on a website and to register or update his address for voting.
An estimated 515,000 Pennsylvania hunters and gun owners are not yet registered to vote, while many who attend Trump’s massive rallies are not yet registered either. Easy online registration is available for Pennsylvania residents here.
The challenge is for Republicans to rack up enough of a winning rural margin to offset the expected ballot-box stuffing by Democrats in the two big cities of this State. The GOP U.S. Senate candidate Dave McCormick could win his race in Pennsylvania by embarking on a large voter registration drive.
Democrats already know that this is how elections are won and lost, and they will be registering many thousands of incoming liberal students at Philadelphia colleges in the next few weeks. The Republican side must match and exceed these registration drives by Dems.
Trump and his savvy new campaign adviser, Corey Lewandowski, understand that Pennsylvania is the key to victory. On Monday Trump gave a speech at a longtime manufacturer in York, Precision Custom Components, which is located in Southeastern Pennsylvania where more voters can be mobilized.
Trump stayed on message, a dismayed newspaper recounted, by focusing on the winning issues of energy, trade, tariffs, immigration, and cutting taxes. Trump promised to cut energy costs in half if reelected, and said he will tell the frackers in Pennsylvania to “drill, baby, drill.”
Trump again criticized Kamala Harris for opposing fracking, an issue on which she flip-flopped recently to try to avoid losing Pennsylvania. Fracking was central to reviving Pennsylvania’s economy after it slumped due to the loss of steel and other manufacturing decades ago.
Democrats have taken Pennsylvania for granted by placing a Californian atop its ticket, whose positions are hostile to the economic needs of this State. Democrats unwisely chose to host its national convention this week in Chicago, which is a liberal city disliked by Pennsylvania and all of rural America.
Once the “Second City” behind only New York City, Chicago will drop to fourth place behind Los Angeles and Houston. The population of crime-ridden Chicago has fallen to its lowest level since 1920, due to Leftist policies that Democrats want to impose nationwide.
Chicago has been the murder capital of our country for 12 years now, announced the New York Post. New York City is three times more populous than Chicago, and yet has barely half as many murders.
There is an epidemic of car-jackings in Chicago, more than 1,000 annually. This Democrat stronghold has not allowed a Republican to be mayor since 1931, nearly a century ago.
Rather than ruin our country as they have Chicago, Democrat delegates could first try to clean up the city they’ve destroyed. People who cannot run a city should not be running our country.
John and Andy Schlafly are sons of Phyllis Schlafly (1924-2016) and lead the continuing Phyllis Schlafly Eagles organizations with writing and policy work.