For the sake of the state Republican Party and Pennsylvania politics as a whole, most GOP candidates for governor should drop out and unite behind the strongest challengers to Franklin County state Sen. Doug Mastriano for the May 17 primary.
Struggling candidates need to think strategically about how to avoid the worst outcome for their party and the state, and that means setting aside short-term ambition and stepping aside from the race.
Mastriano may present himself as a populist, but he’s no reformer or voice for the left-behind: He’s one of Pennsylvania’s, and the entire country’s, most visible deniers of the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election. He took the lead in calling for the Pennsylvania legislature to appoint its own slate of presidential electors. He traveled to Arizona to witness the ridiculous Maricopa County election audit. And, just last week, he headlined an event promoting the QAnon conspiracy theory.
He either knows better and is cynically trying to ride a wave of lies, or he has been genuinely hoodwinked. Either way, he’s dangerous — not to the “elite,” but to ordinary Pennsylvanians, who need to count on their leaders to connect with reality.
With less than two weeks left in the primary, Mastriano is polling in the upper-teens, which is enough for first place in a nine-person field, with many voters still undecided. His closest competitors are former U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta and former U.S. Attorney Bill McSwain, with former Delaware County Councilmember Dave White showing some late strength.
No one else has cracked single digits in any major poll. That includes state Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman, former U.S. Rep. Melissa Hart, strategist Charlie Gerow, Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Gale and cardiothoracic surgeon Nche Zama. This isn’t a presidential primary, where a surprise finish in a small state can boost a candidacy. They get one shot, and it’s not happening. They will serve their party and their state best by graciously bowing out and supporting a legitimate contender.
The appearance of establishment collusion may bolster Mastriano’s pseudo-populist narrative, but the fractured nine-candidate field is riskier. If the GOP is saddled with a fringe candidate in November, the party will lose big — and drag the state’s political culture (even further) down with it. And it will have its own leaders, and selfish candidates, to blame.
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