What is happening in Pennsylvania? A trend, or back to normal?

[wbrocks67]

Here to get everyone's thoughts on perpetually purple (though I guess you could argue besides 2016, Tilt D) Pennsylvania.

Obviously, Trump happened in 2016. He won in PA 48.2% - 47.5%. 3rd party candidates picked up 4.4%. It would appear that HRC was just a bad candidate for PA (or Trump was a good one), but it appeared it was more than just the two of them -- Pat Toomey also beat Katie McGinty by a little more than Trump's margin in the senate race. So even in a non Hillary-Trump race, Toomey performed generally the same statewide (with better margins in the suburbs a bit).

HOWEVER, in 2018, obviously things swung back to the Dems favor. Wolf won by 17% and Casey won by 13%. PA actually had one of the biggest swings from 2016, bigger than Michigan or Wisconsin.

Obviously this had to do some with candidate quality (Wagner and Barletta were not good), though I think the Senate race was pretty close to Generic D vs. Generic R. Casey obv has name recognition, but most people don't particularly feel one way or the other about him. While Barletta had no scandals, and despite his super-right past in Hazelton, I don't think that was common knowledge for most folks.

Not to mention, Conor Lamb's huge early 2018 swing in a Trump district. Also, Wolf and Casey simply demolished Barletta and Wagner in the suburbs.

So what is happening? Realignment? Back to PA's Tilt D past? Is this a super-charged reaction to Trumpism?

To me, it's a combo of all 3, but if you're looking for a state that took a chance on Trump the most and now has repudiated Trumpism the most, I think PA is the best example.