{"id":29665,"date":"2022-05-24T00:19:00","date_gmt":"2022-05-24T00:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=29665"},"modified":"2022-05-25T15:11:21","modified_gmt":"2022-05-25T15:11:21","slug":"appealing-to-trump-and-his-base-might-have-worked-in-pennsylvania-primaries-but-it-wont-play-so-well-in-the-midterms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/appealing-to-trump-and-his-base-might-have-worked-in-pennsylvania-primaries-but-it-wont-play-so-well-in-the-midterms\/","title":{"rendered":"Appealing to Trump (and his base) might have worked in Pennsylvania primaries \u2013 but it won\u2019t play so well in the midterms"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Daniel J. Mallinson<\/a>, Penn State<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Pennsylvania primaries<\/a> of May 17, 2022, proved a good night for Donald Trump, a better one for \u201cTrumpism\u201d and a problem for moderates hoping for a candidate primed to capture the center in the upcoming midterms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s officially endorsed Senate candidate, Mehmet Oz, is currently in a tight race<\/a> with main GOP rival David McCormick \u2013 with the balloting set for a recount.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both ran their primary campaign as Trumpist candidates and vied for the former president\u2019s nod<\/a>. Meanwhile, third place in the GOP race went to Kathy Barnette, a Fox News commentator who touts herself as more MAGA than Trump<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fact that all three leading GOP candidates had the DNA of Trumpism in them suggests a couple of things. First, it indicates that echoing the policies, rhetorical style and personality of the former president can be an effective tool for Republican candidates seeking to appeal to the party base. And this is especially important in a closed-primary state<\/a> such as Pennsylvania, in which only party members have a say in who gets to run for Senate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And second, it raises a question about the tried-and-tested plan of candidates\u2019 appealing to the party base in the primary before pivoting closer to the center in the general election: Will that post-primary transformation be possible for Republicans in Pennsylvania \u2013 and elsewhere \u2013 in 2022?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All local politics is national<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The Pennsylvania primary proved that the adage that \u201call politics is local<\/a>\u201d has to some degree been inverted: Local and state elections are now run on national issues and are influenced by national figures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But whereas a Trump endorsement in the recent Ohio primary resulted in an immediate surge<\/a> for his anointed candidate, J.D. Vance, Pennsylvania didn\u2019t quite play out the same way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oz\u2019s chance of winning was certainly not harmed by getting Trump\u2019s stamp of approval<\/a>. But he didn\u2019t seem to take many votes off McCormick or Barnette in the process. In fact, some see Barnette faring better than expected<\/a> because Trump supporters decided to vote for her as \u201cthe more Trump\u201d candidate, over Oz as the \u201cofficial\u201d Trump candidate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, Trump\u2019s endorsement actually meant very little for Doug Mastriano, who won the state\u2019s GOP primary for governor. Mastriano \u2013 an avidly Trumpian candidate who repeats the former president\u2019s election conspiracy theories \u2013 was already pulling ahead<\/a> by the time Trump made a late nod of approval in his favor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The point is, whether these Republican candidates are seen as being faithful to Trump\u2019s signature MAGA cause is what matters when it comes to winning in these primaries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But here\u2019s the rub for Republicans. That may work well enough in firing up the base during primary season, but it complicates the pivot to running against Democrats \u2013 and appealing to more moderate voters \u2013 in the midterm election. A candidate like Mastriano will have to defend positions like<\/a> a total ban on abortion, reversal of support for mail-in voting and conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pennsylvania is seen as a toss-up state<\/a> when it comes to the Senate vote. In such circumstances, appealing to the center becomes more important \u2013 party faithful tend to be locked in; swing voters are up for grabs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any GOP candidate who hitches his or her wagon to Trumpian policies and rhetoric may find it harder to appeal to centrists \u2013 and may actually alienate some moderate Republicans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Circling back to the center<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

A similar dynamic played out in Pennsylvania in the Democratic primary race for Senate, but with success found by positioning policies to the left of the center. One of the more progressive candidates, Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, prevailed against<\/a> the moderate Rep. Conor Lamb.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even so, Fetterman has, I believe, more room to maneuver come the general election. Fetterman has experience running for \u2013 and winning \u2013 a statewide office before. Moreover, he has carefully cultivated an \u201ceveryman\u201d image, which could play well against either Oz or hedge fund CEO McCormick. Even so, he will have to defend more progressive positions that could also turn off moderate Republicans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Success in the Pennsylvania primaries came to those candidates able to position themselves away from the center and more in line with the party\u2019s ideological extreme. But it is the Republican candidate, in vying against others for Trump\u2019s blessing as well as his base, who might find it more difficult to circle back to the center during the midterms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Daniel J. Mallinson<\/a>, Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Administration, School of Public Affairs, Penn State<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Daniel J. Mallinson, Penn State The Pennsylvania primaries of May 17, 2022, proved a good night for Donald Trump, a better one for \u201cTrumpism\u201d and a problem for moderates hoping for a candidate primed to capture the center in the upcoming midterms. Trump\u2019s officially endorsed Senate candidate, Mehmet Oz, is currently in a tight race […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":29666,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[46,4],"tags":[11872,771,479,11870,2885,11869,6741,770,9273,11871,683,3236],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29665"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29665"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29665\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29667,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29665\/revisions\/29667"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}