Over the summer, Republican Dave McCormick has been fighting from behind against longtime U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr. (D-Pa.), with polls regularly giving the incumbent a double-digit lead.
But with fall in the air and voters more focused on the race, the RealClearPolitics average gives Casey just a three-point advantage. And a new CNN poll of 789 likely voters released this week shows the race tied 46 percent.
“This is a real boost for the McCormick campaign,” longtime Pennsylvania GOP political strategist Vince Galko of Mercury told DVJournal.
The CNN poll also found Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Vice President Kamala Harris tied at 47 percent in the Keystone State. Libertarian Chase Oliver and Green Party Jill Stein each received one percent.
Those results are in line with other recent polls. The RealClearPolitics polling average has Trump and Harris tied at 47.2 percent.
McCormick’s campaign to topple a three-term incumbent Democrat is one of the most high-profile contests in the country, and it could decide whether Republicans split the Senate 50-5o or win an outright majority. (If the Senate is tied, the newly-elected vice president would cast tie-breaking votes, giving the winner of the White House functional control of the chamber.)
Recent voter canvasses showed McCormick slowly gaining on Casey after months of level support. He had been polling in the upper 30s to lower 40s before hitting between 43 and 47 percent last month.
Casey, meanwhile, saw his support drop below 50 percent for the fourth poll in a row. Republican strategist Christopher Nicholas of Eagle Consulting told DVJournal that Casey’s support is now in the “danger zone for incumbents.”
The results sent off alarm bells within Casey campaign circles. His team sent an email to donors Thursday warning, “We can’t afford to fall behind now.”
Both candidates have some crossover appeal, according to the CNN poll. Casey brought in four percent of Republican-leaning voters, while McCormick picked up five percent of Democrat-leaners. Among Donald Trump voters, Casey received four percent support while McCormick received three percent from Kamala Harris voters. Previous polls gave McCormick zero Democrat support.
While Casey led McCormick 52 to 31 among the all-important independent vote, the poll found McCormick siphoned eight percent of liberal support from Casey. The incumbent pulled 12 percent of conservative support from McCormick.
The growing divide between college-educated voters and their working-class counterparts that is reshaping American politics is also on display in Pennsylvania’s Senate race. McCormick is beating Casey 53-38 percent among non-college graduates, and he heads 48-39 percent among voters earning less than $50,000 a year. Those voters were long the base of the Democratic Party, but they’re now joining the GOP.
Casey, on the other hand, is picking up White, affluent suburbanites who used to vote Republican. He leads McCormick 51 to 45 percent among those earning more than $50,000.
Ironically, it’s McCormick who has a PhD from Princeton and served as CEO of Bridgewater, one of the world’s largest hedge funds, from 2017 to 2022. Casey graduated from Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. and got his law degree from Catholic University in Washington, D.C.
Galko said the poll showed McCormick’s campaign is working. “It will excite volunteers, encourage donors, and restore confidence in his strategy,” he said.
McCormick and Casey will debate Oct. 3 at 8 p.m.
In the race for the White House, both presidential candidates have mostly consolidated their party’s base in Pennsylvania. Harris has 91 percent support from Democrats and Trump has 94 percent of the GOP on board. Harris led Trump by 20 points among independent voters, 51 percent to 31 percent, and leads among self-declared moderates 54-38 percent.
Forty percent of voters labeled the economy as the most important issue for 2024, and Trump edged out Harris among those voters, 50-42 percent.
