Nationwide, and in Pennsylvania, the Democratic bench is thin.
The Democratic Party is in desperate need of young up-and-comers who can rise up the ranks in the years ahead.
As a result Josh Shapiro, 43 year-old newly elected Attorney General, stands out among PA politicos.
Shapiro’s actually been considered a rising star for years now. In fact, Democrats wanted him to take on Pat Toomey this year in the Senate race. For a variety of reasons, though, he chose to seek the AG position instead.
With 99.93% of the vote in, Shapiro not only defeated GOP nominee State Sen. John Rafferty, he scored more support than any other statewide candidate:
1. Josh Shapiro 2,985,166
2. Joe Torsella 2,923,879
3. Donald Trump 2,905,958
4. Eugene DePasquale 2,890,199
5. Pat Toomey 2,886,455
Of course, there aren’t any clear upward paths at the moment with incumbent Democrats Tom Wolf and Bob Casey seeking re-election in 2018 for Governor and Senator respectively.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing, however, as sometimes pols can try to move up too fast. After all, four years ago Kathleen Kane pulled off this same feat and became the talk of the commonwealth. Look how well that turned out.
Loading ...
15 Responses
I coulda got more votes if I knew Politics PA was making a big deal about it. I’m a winner. Always a winner. HUGE!!!!
Too bad they did not bother to show all the statewide returns because they say a lot. The dems lose elections because they nominate awful candidates.
After spending millions of dollars on McGinty’s primary campaign for no other reason than to keep Sestak off the ballot for not being their idea of a team player, they then spent tens of millions on McGinty against Toomey (who was vulnerable, and who Sestak probably would have defeated). McGinty ranked dead last in total votes among Democrats with 2,792,526. That was nearly 200,000 fewer votes than Shapiro received. The second lowest Democratic vote getter was none other than Hillary Clinton with 2,843,522 — nearly 150,000 less than Shapiro.
I truly believe that the Democrats would rather lose with candidates like Hillary Clinton and Katy McGinty than win with candidates like Sanders and Sestak who don’t fall in line behind the machine. The Democrats would win a lot more elections if they let the people freely select the candidates. Obviously I was not the only Democrat who voted for Jill Stein or wrote in Joe Sestak.
He got the most votes because AG was the only 2-way statewide race. No third party alternatives to choose from.
Betty is right, Republicans have figured out how to dominate State Senate and House races, but their state-wide program sucks. Where do they find these losers?
Maybe nominating Rafferty was yet another bad move by the RSC? I mean, they ought to try to win, right? How about running someone from suburban Pittsburgh? Not a small time senator from the same county where Shapiro represents 3 times as many people and is prominent in the Philly media market.
pete-
Kane holds the record for potentially exposing the most elected politicians and them needing to silence her.
So much for your laughable reader polls that showed Rafferty & Voit in the lead prior to the election!!
One big guy on the Dem’s bench who’s not getting mentioned here: John Fetterman
The mistakes of Kathleen Kane do not diminish the much good she did to expose the hypocrisy and corruption in the PA judicial system.
Is it Kathleen Kane or Kathleen Krutch?
Kane also holds the record for being disbarred, called to resign by the governor and senate, indicted, charged, and convicted in the shortest time….
Kathleen Kane still holds the record with 3,125,557 votes in 2012.
She’s still the best AG elected in PA, taking down two Supreme court judges and exposing the unprofessionalism that permeates the “justice” system.
Maybe he will hire Teplitz or Shady Katie. #isenhourspatronagewhors
Joe torsella gets 33000 more votes than depasquale,he must be the right kind of joe.
Kathleen Kane smoked everyone in the 2012 election with 3 mullion plus votes. How did that turn out…..