Why did Bob Casey lose?

[here2view]

He ran the Bill Nelson 2018 campaign.

[Jumped off the American Sinking Ship]

Hogan's megacoattails

[Progressive Pessimist]

He ran the Bill Nelson 2018 campaign.

Yeah, Democrats always have to lose one winnable Senate race every cycle. Casey was the one for 2024.

[Talleyrand]

He ran the Bill Nelson 2018 campaign.

Yeah, Democrats always have to lose one winnable Senate race every cycle. Casey was the one for 2024.

To be fair, hasn't this been the case for Republicans too? The issue is they have more room for error.

2020- GA-S, GA-R
2022- GA, NV, maybe PA/AZ
2024- NV, PA, AZ, MI

[Progressive Pessimist]

He ran the Bill Nelson 2018 campaign.

Yeah, Democrats always have to lose one winnable Senate race every cycle. Casey was the one for 2024.

To be fair, hasn't this been the case for Republicans too? The issue is they have more room for error.

2020- GA-S, GA-R
2022- GA, NV, maybe PA/AZ
2024- NV, PA, AZ, MI

That's true, but their error is with their candidates while with Democrats it just seems to be circumstance.

[#LANK]

- Casey being a mediocre campaigner caught up to him. Bob is great and has been a wonderful senator, but he's not a good public speaker. Unfortunately, that stuff counts, and he's just not enough of a dynamic presence. McCormick really isn't either, but again, with the other factors, it allowed McCormick to squeak by
- Given PA GOP's recent candidates like Scott Wagner, Oz, Barletta, etc., McCormick was able to make himself look a little more normal than the rest and I think that went a long way. Just look at Casey's performance in the suburbs, it was pretty mediocre all things considered. I think there was definitely a few folks who have been voting Dem a lot recently who may have thought he may not be that bad, or split Harris/McCormick.
- Casey was unable to succesfully define McCormick early. Him and his team just didn't have the same juice that Fetterman's team did to define McCormick as out of touch and a carpetbagger. The strategy just wasn't really cohesive enough. Casey's social media presence being nil also didn't help with key constituencies

How wretched that Casey's consistent receptivity to constituent services/desires didn't cut it when we know how superficial we can towards gestures like Kerry goose-hunting or Trump McDonalds. Indeed for all my issues with Fetterman in-office he understood the value of Every County Every Vote and while stereotypical to say retail politics is important to bridge the numerous divides Keystone parochiality can bring about. Whether rallying in Forest County barely numbering 6,000 residents to talking about bodily autonomy in the Main Line suburbs or checking in with Black business owners in West Philly while connecting his support for gun safety measures with the Tree of Life shooting and running ads on how he worked with Braddock police to bring down violent crime he played into Oz's own bumbling Wegner's blunders and blunted the opposing onslaught of attack ads chanting that he would soon come to bring us radical socialism. All that said he was quite fortunate Oz barely scraped out the primary over McCormick. I will also note that Barletta is a joke candidate statewide but his career ever since he was Hazleton mayor challenging Kanjorski for his seat has illustrated the potency of "they took our jerbs!" nativism in NEPA

[Miked0920]

A number of factors came into play in Casey's unexpected defeat in the 2024 Senate Race here.

_First off, Dave McCormick was the toughest opposing candidate Bob Casey has faced in his general election. Despite being a carpetbagger living largely in Connecticut was able to put on a a facade as a working class everyman, which took a huge bite into Casey's numbers with white working class voter who supported him in droves in previous elections. Mccormick was also helped by Trump winning PA by around 1.7% and Casey's poor campaign being unable to generate the ticket splitting Casey would have needed to hang on. Bob Casey thought his family name and popularity would be enough to hang on and didn't successfully define McCormick as am out of touch carpetbagger until it was too late, unlike John Fetterman who successfully painted Dr OZ in that light back in 2022.

_ Second, McCormick being a former CEO of the prominent Hedge Fund Bridgewater Associates, had nearly unlimited financial resources to go all out. With a net worth of around 165 million dollars he saturated the airwaves portraying Casey as a Washington Liberal who shed his moderate image from his first election in 2006, getting his message out at least two months before Casey began even airing adds/getting his message out. McCormick wasn't flawless but he was a far better candidate by comparison to (Kari Lake in AZ, Sam Brown in NV, or Eric Hovde in WI who were just terrible and ran worse campaigns by comparison).

_Third, Casey underperformed in key areas that a Democrat needs to generally win in PA. He barely survived in Bucks County by 0.5% while Kamala Harris narrowly lost Bucks. He lost the bellwether Northampton County (Home to Easton and Bethlehem), which usually picks the winners in PA elections, He also barely won key counties that had supported him by larger margins in the past (Monroe, Erie, Centre, etc). (Casey also received around 47000 fewer votes in Philadelphia than Harris did, and neither candidate hit the magic number of 80% or so generally needed for a Democrat to win the Keystone State with.

_Fourth and finally, Bob Casey ran a lackluster, lazy and bad campaign, (eerily similar to Bill Nelson in Florida from 2018). Not even hitting the campaign trail or airing large amounts of ads until late in the race and not even airing adds month or so of the campaign. As a result Mccormick's message of Casey changing to a Liberal Dem from a Moderate Dem largely scored direct hits and not going answered until too late into the race. Casey was therefore unable to generate enough crossover appeal to survive Trump winning his state, (Unlike Slotkin in MI, Baldwin in WI, Gallego in AZ, or Rosen in NV).

Overall Casey had been an excellent senator for PA but a terrible campaigner and that's what ultimately doomed him.

[wbrocks67]

My hometown districts in Montco feel like a good microcosm - my Senate and House districts are left-trending suburban districts. Casey underperformed both Madeleine Dean *and* Harris. Montco should've been a place where the opposite happened.

SD-44
Dean +10.5
Harris +10.4
Casey +9.5

HD-150
Dean +16.8
Harris +15.9
Casey +14.9

[#LANK]

A number of factors came into play in Casey's unexpected defeat in the 2024 Senate Race here.

_First off, Dave McCormick was the toughest opposing candidate Bob Casey has faced in his general election. Despite being a carpetbagger living largely in Connecticut was able to put on a a facade as a working class everyman, which took a huge bite into Casey's numbers with white working class voter who supported him in droves in previous elections. Mccormick was also helped by Trump winning PA by around 1.7% and Casey's poor campaign being unable to generate the ticket splitting Casey would have needed to hang on. Bob Casey thought his family name and popularity would be enough to hang on and didn't successfully define McCormick as am out of touch carpetbagger until it was too late, unlike John Fetterman who successfully painted Dr OZ in that light back in 2022.

_ Second, McCormick being a former CEO of the prominent Hedge Fund Bridgewater Associates, had nearly unlimited financial resources to go all out. With a net worth of around 165 million dollars he saturated the airwaves portraying Casey as a Washington Liberal who shed his moderate image from his first election in 2006, getting his message out at least two months before Casey began even airing adds/getting his message out. McCormick wasn't flawless but he was a far better candidate by comparison to (Kari Lake in AZ, Sam Brown in NV, or Eric Hovde in WI who were just terrible and ran worse campaigns by comparison).

_Third, Casey underperformed in key areas that a Democrat needs to generally win in PA. He barely survived in Bucks County by 0.5% while Kamala Harris narrowly lost Bucks. He lost the bellwether Northampton County (Home to Easton and Bethlehem), which usually picks the winners in PA elections, He also barely won key counties that had supported him by larger margins in the past (Monroe, Erie, Centre, etc). (Casey also received around 47000 fewer votes in Philadelphia than Harris did, and neither candidate hit the magic number of 80% or so generally needed for a Democrat to win the Keystone State with.

_Fourth and finally, Bob Casey ran a lackluster, lazy and bad campaign, (eerily similar to Bill Nelson in Florida from 2018). Not even hitting the campaign trail or airing large amounts of ads until late in the race and not even airing adds month or so of the campaign. As a result Mccormick's message of Casey changing to a Liberal Dem from a Moderate Dem largely scored direct hits and not going answered until too late into the race. Casey was therefore unable to generate enough crossover appeal to survive Trump winning his state, (Unlike Slotkin in MI, Baldwin in WI, Gallego in AZ, or Rosen in NV).

Overall Casey had been an excellent senator for PA but a terrible campaigner and that's what ultimately doomed him.

His camp produced this ad that I recall seeing once or twice during some phightins’ games, idk whatever internals they were going off of but imo its malfeasance they didn’t plaster this across the Commonwealth

[David Hume]

Frankly, I and many others overestimated his strength as a candidate. It seems as though he had lost his image of "Pennsylvania's guy" and instead was successfully branded as a career politician who doesn't actually do anything. McCormick was able to harness the anger towards the Biden admin and paint him as a rubber stamp for their agenda. Ultimately, when voters lose faith in your ability to get sh*t done and resist politics as usual, it's going to doom your candidacy.

Casey's PA family name and incumbency (which I assumed were to his advantage) were turned against him successfully - talking with PA relatives, it seems like he was able to be painted as someone who had traded in his PA bonafides for just a rubber stamp democrat, and combined with Trump's strength in the state managed to eek McCormick over the line.

Yep. It's fascinating because we know there are plenty of examples of people getting elected in states where their relatives were popular (Beshear in KY, Menendez Jr in NJ, etc)

You must have some misunderstanding in either popular or Menendez.

[CheapDollarEra?]

McCormick did a decent campaing and had "sensible republican" vibes.
Also, Casey was too confident on his chances.

[Blair]

Frankly, I and many others overestimated his strength as a candidate. It seems as though he had lost his image of "Pennsylvania's guy" and instead was successfully branded as a career politician who doesn't actually do anything. McCormick was able to harness the anger towards the Biden admin and paint him as a rubber stamp for their agenda. Ultimately, when voters lose faith in your ability to get sh*t done and resist politics as usual, it's going to doom your candidacy.

Casey's PA family name and incumbency (which I assumed were to his advantage) were turned against him successfully - talking with PA relatives, it seems like he was able to be painted as someone who had traded in his PA bonafides for just a rubber stamp democrat, and combined with Trump's strength in the state managed to eek McCormick over the line.

Yep. It's fascinating because we know there are plenty of examples of people getting elected in states where their relatives were popular (Beshear in KY, Menendez Jr in NJ, etc) but it's starting to feel like that as a phenomenon is dwindling and voters are less likely to elect candidates just based on being "so and so's son" or whatever. It does make me wonder how members of the Trump family will do if they decide to run for office in statewide races, because I feel like they could buck the trend but Trump is obviously a national figure and not merely just a statewide figure the way that the aforementioned examples are.

Appreciate you know PA much better than me but I do wonder if part of that is that the type of voters who like Casey Snr or even who voted for Casey in 2006 are either now frankly dead, or much more likely to vote republican- I assume people who voted for him because he was a Casey are laregly pro-life & socially conservative, and well it's just harder to get these people to vote for him.

Re him being a bad candidate it's worth remembering he did lose the 2002 primary for Governor despite laregly being seen as having the state party behind him.

I do wonder too if unlike the others (MI, WI, NV) he had the misfortune of not having had a competitive cycle in the social media era so wasn't really use to having a tough race; Baldwin for example knew from 2023 what she needed to be doing & saying in case the national picture was worse than they thought it was.

[Miles]

There was a good podcast out earlier this week with McCormick's general consultant.

Lots of interesting bits, but it confirmed something I had assumed: Casey was never truly pressed in a Senate race before 2024, and they thought that if they could get him in a competitive race, he'd lose his balance, so to speak.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Harris lost. And some Amish were mad about milk pasteurization rules.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

Guns is a big issue as I said earlier Amish or Blue collar whites are pro gun rights even in the Midwest . As I said before voters said Walz was too liberal

She should of picked Beshear everyone on ones to that realization now