PHILADELPHIA — Republicans had a major political comeback in Pennsylvania in 2024 after a series of disappointments in recent elections.

President-elect Donald Trump won the state by a margin of 1.7 percentage points. Republicans swept the row offices, and ousted two incumbent Democrats in the U.S. House along with longtime U.S. Sen. Bob Casey.

They even flipped a Northeast Philly state Senate seat, electing the first Republican state senator to represent Philadelphia in more than two decades, maintaining their six-seat majority in the chamber, and securing a foothold in the Democratic-leaning city.

Republicans focused on the economy, immigration, and attacking President Joe Biden while national Democratic messaging focused on abortion and protecting democracy. The Republican Party was bolstered by the Trump campaign's appeal to, and focus on people who like him but may not otherwise show up to the polls, as well as anti-incumbent sentiment. His campaign also thrived among young men.

“When he's on the ballot, Republicans do better,” said Robert Speel, a political science professor at Penn State Behrend.

Trump drove voters to the poll who proceeded to vote Republican down the ballot.

“I just vote Republican. I know more about Donald Trump than anybody,” Nick Cromley, 56, a dishwasher at Dickinson College in Carlisle, said two days after the election. Cromley said he was a Democrat until Trump first ran for office.

Red wave

This year, Pennsylvania, like the rest of the country, shifted right on the national level. Trump won Pennsylvania with more votes than any other Republican statewide candidate in history by bolstering his support in rural areas, chipping away at Vice President Kamala Harris' advantage in the suburbs and urban areas — and benefiting from her campaign's underperformance in these areas.

The Philly suburbs helped Trump win the presidency in 2024, with more than 200 municipalities in the area shifting more toward the president-elect. He became the first Republican presidential candidate to win Bucks county since 1988 and made gains among working class voters in Delaware County.

Trump also had a clear impact on congressional races in Pennsylvania. Democratic Reps. Susan Wild and Matt Cartwright lost their seats to Republican challengers, State Rep. Ryan Mackenzie and Rob Bresnahan Jr., in areas that Trump has made gains in since 2020, garnering support from working-class Latino and Rust Belt voters in the Lehigh Valley and Northeast Pennsylvania.

Many Latino voters in Pennsylvania favored Trump's promises on the economy, setting aside the candidate's incendiary rhetoric or their disdain for his personality.

Trump's victory was a reversal from 2020 when Biden won by a little more than one percentage point with the help of the Philadelphia suburbs, cities, and areas around his native Scranton. Harris lacked Biden's special appeal to the Scranton area.

Despite voters rejecting Trump four years ago, he was still seen as a powerhouse for widespread Republican successes in the state that year including key wins in state-level offices.

The GOP also bounced back this year from widespread losses across Pennsylvania and a rejection of Trump-endorsed candidates in the 2022 midterms, especially State Sen. Doug Mastriano (R., Franklin), who lost the governorship to Democrat Josh Shapiro by more than 14 percentage points.

How Donald Trump and the GOP bounced back in Pennsylvania

Republicans halved Democrats' voter registration advantage in the state over the last four years, and while some Democratic Party leaders dismissed the registration increase as a lagging indicator of the support Trump already had in the state, the GOP saw it as a promising result of a dedicated ground game.

In 2022, many Pennsylvania Republicans owed their losses in every major race to Mastriano, who held extreme positions, under-fundraised, and barely participated in outreach beyond his base. Trump was considered toxic to some Republicans and their vast defeat prompted some soul-searching.

In 2024, Republicans refrained from running candidates like Mastriano in Pennsylvania, and the potency of issues like abortion rights — which helped galvanize Democrats' success in 2022 five months after the Supreme Court's overturn of Roe v. Wade — had diminished in favor of voters' focus on topics like immigration and the economy.

And Trump — now a more “matured” politician in 2024, said Josh Novotney, a GOP lobbyist and strategist in Pennsylvania — catered to working class and low propensity voters, driving turnout and chipping away votes in historically Democratic areas. Republicans down the ballot in Pennsylvania benefited from it.

“I think for the most part, the oxygen in the room was eaten up by the presidential, so I think Trump did bring out a lot of voters that historically don't come out for Republicans,” Novotney said.

Sen.-elect Dave McCormick was the first GOP Senate or gubernatorial candidate to win Pennsylvania since 2016, and he did it in part by catering to low-propensity voters across the state just as Trump has in the past.

Mackenzie and Bresnahan, who flipped the longtime Democratic held 7th and 8th Congressional Districts, told The Inquirer last month they believed enthusiasm spurred by Trump's candidacy — and their own merits — pushed them to victory.

State Sen.-elect Joe Picozzi believes he was able to flip a Democratic seat in Northeast Philadelphia “because we knocked 70,000 doors, because we went to every event we were invited to, because we met the people where they were at,” he told The Inquirer Thursday, noting a newfound shift from the “country club Republican Party” to a “Republican Party that speaks to the actual, real, you know, kitchen table concerns, blue collar Americans.”

His win was referred to by one elected Democrat as “the most embarrassing part” of the election results, and State Sen. Sharif Street, the Pennsylvania Democratic Party chair, said Picozzi had a particularly strong ground game as his Democratic opponent had weaknesses.

For a successful future for the GOP in Pennsylvania, Republicans will have to determine how to continue cultivating their support among middle class and working class voters, Novotney said.

“If we can figure out how to do that, to use those kitchen table issues that I think we went on with both working class and middle class folks, I think that's a long-term majority recipe right there,” he said.

A single bright spot for Dems

Pennsylvania is still purple. Democratic Sen. John Fetterman holds one of the two U.S. Senate seats and Shapiro has remained a well-liked governor and potential presidential contender in 2028.

Amid widespread disappointments, Democrats had one bright spot this election: They held onto their one-seat majority in the state House as voters split their tickets.

State House Democrats were successful because they focused on championing their district-specific accomplishments in lieu of the national party's “more esoteric” values-based messaging, said Street, the state party chair. Ironically, much of their successes were possible because of the Biden administration's economic conditions, he said.

It's not that voters disagree with Democratic values, Street argued, they just didn't want to hear about them while they were worrying about getting food on the table, a concern Republicans messaged on more successfully.

Voters who showed up in 2024 and not 2022 “were more likely to blame Biden and Harris for inflation and were more receptive to Trump's promise to upend the establishment,” said David Wasserman, political analyst at the nonpartisan Cook Political Report.

So with the 2026 midterms looming and lower turnout expected, the question is whether Republicans can maintain their strength in the state without Trump on the ballot and a different segment of voters showing up.

“The formula of Trumpism without Trump hasn't worked in any off year elections for the most part,” said Adam Carlson, a data analyst and former pollster.

Carlson expects dissatisfaction with Trump in the White House will help the Democratic Party recruit strong candidates. Democrats can also take solace in knowing that their U.S. House candidates outperformed Harris in the most competitive Pennsylvania districts.

The impact of Trump not being on the ballot in 2022, in Street's eyes, depends on how he does as president.

“Republicans might be glad he's not on the ballot, depending on how he governs,” he said. “ … Whether Trump is an asset or a liability, we've seen him be both.”

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