How Lancaster Fell
When Republican Ryan Aument ran for the state Senate in 2018, he won by 33 percentage points. In 2022, he was unopposed. But when he resigned at the end of 2024 to work for U.S. Senator Dave McCormick, his former seat flipped to a Democrat, James Malone, by a narrow margin of 482 votes.
How did this happen? Does it suggest larger changes in the Pennsylvania electorate? And will Malone be able to hold the seat when it comes up for election again in 2026?
The first question many are asking is: is the 36th Senate District a Republican district or not? The short answer is: it is, except once in a while when it isn’t.
As the map below shows, Donald Trump won this district easily less than six months ago with a fifteen-point margin of victory (56.89 percent to Kamala Harris’s 41.58 percent.) The county as a whole has not voted for a Democrat for president since 1964.
https://www.politicspa.com/how-lancaster-fell/141090/
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