McCormick makes campaign stop at Penn United
JEFFERSON TWP — In the final weeks of a closely fought race for Pennsylvania’s contested U.S. Senate seat, Republican candidate Dave McCormick brought his campaign to Penn United Technologies on North Pike Road on Tuesday, Oct. 22.
Dozens of McCormick’s supporters gathered on the top floor of Building 6 to listen to the candidate make a late campaign push.
Tuesday’s visit was put together on short notice and organized largely by Patrick Santorum, the son of former United States senator and presidential candidate Rick Santorum and a member of McCormick’s campaign team.
“One of his people gave me a call on Saturday night at 10 o’clock, and he asked if we could get a small group of our employees together,” said Bill Jones, president of Penn United, referring to Patrick. “I said, ‘absolutely.’”
Jones estimated that more than 80 Penn United employees attended.
This isn’t the first time Penn United has been the site of a political campaign event. Coincidentally, Rick Santorum, a former U.S. senator, in 2015 used the facility as the stage to announce his intention to seek the Republican nomination for president in 2016.
During his speech Tuesday, McCormick reiterated many of the same points he has stressed throughout his campaign. They include the need for Pennsylvania and the United States to become “energy independent” and make use of its vast natural gas reserves, securing the U.S.-Mexico border, reducing government spending, quelling inflation, and tightening restrictions on trade with China.
“I'm in this race because I think the country is at a tipping point,” McCormick said. “I think we're going to wake up one morning and we’re not going to recognize the America we love.”
Despite his primary loss in the 2022 senate race, McCormick expressed confidence that he could defeat Democratic incumbent Bob Casey, who he called an “absentee senator.” Casey was elected to the Senate for the first time in 2006. Before that, Casey served as the state’s auditor general and treasurer.
“Bob Casey's been in elected office for 30 years,” McCormick said. “He's made $6 million off taxpayers paying him for salary and benefits for 30 years. Can anybody think of anything that Bob Casey did for anyone in this room that has changed your life for the better?”
For this campaign event, McCormick had local officials vouching for him, including Butler County Sheriff Mike Slupe, who said he has been a supporter of McCormick since his first Senate run in 2022. That year, McCormick narrowly lost in the Republican primary to television personality Dr. Mehmet Oz.
“That's the only time that I was upset at Trump. He endorsed the wrong guy,” Slupe said. “I'm very proud to endorse him, and we got 47, 48 other sheriffs who endorse him throughout the Commonwealth.”
Following Slupe at the event was U.S. Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., who broadcast dire warnings to the crowd about what might happen if Casey and the Democrats win on Nov. 5, including the potential of removing the Senate filibuster, changing the makeup of the Supreme Court, and adding Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico as states which would increase the number of electoral votes from potentially liberal areas.
“We have a unique opportunity to take the Senate,” Hagerty said. “And we have an extraordinarily highly capable candidate in Dave McCormick who can help us do that.”
While most of the crowd consisted of Penn United employees, William Thiele — whose farm is less than a mile away — also showed up to lend his support and ask McCormick about agriculture. Thiele said he was invited to the event by state Rep. Marci Mustello, R-11th.
