It’s been at least 104 years since the Democratic Party has had a majority on the Dauphin County Board of Commissioners.
Let me say that again – 104 years. 1919!
And Dauphin Dems are on the doorstep of taking the majority away from Republicans after the results of Tuesday’s municipal election.
Justin Douglas has provided the difference.
The pastor of a Harrisburg church, Douglas holds a 42-vote lead over incumbent Republican Chad Saylor for the third seat on the Board. Fellow Democrat George P. Hartwick III and Republican Mike Pries are running 1-2 in the race with approximately 250 military and overseas, as well as provisional votes remaining to be counted.
“I’m profoundly grateful for the voters who demonstrated that local elections indeed have a significant impact, and that change can originate from the grassroots. Our campaign was driven solely by the people, with no special interests involved, and it fills us with immense humility and optimism to see where we stand today,” Douglas said in a statement released early Wednesday morning.
Dauphin Democrats also paved the way for a 3,300-vote margin in the county for Dan McCaffery for Supreme Court, a 1,700-vote advantage for Matt Wolf for Commonwealth Court, a win for clerk of courts Bridget Whitley and sweeps on the Derry Township (Hershey) and Swatara Township board of commissioners.
“Prison reform was a central part of my campaign,” Douglas told PennLive, which included a graphic billboard on heavily traveled Route 322 that highlighted 18 inmate deaths at Dauphin County Prison since 2019, the year of the last commissioners’ election.
“People care about that, and this campaign proved that you can be successful by running on issues that people care about.”
Harris said that was all supplemented by a bigger county party effort on mailing and door-to-door canvassing than in some recent cycles, even as Republican incumbent commissioners Pries and Saylor sat out several pre-election candidate forums.
7 Responses
Republicans need a new gameplan starting at the National and State Levels to provide tools to County organizations. Dems know how to turn out mail in votes, Rs need to figure it out too! The abortion issue was successfully weaponized by the Dems. Rs need to figure it out, heard some good ideas at the GOP debate Wed, pro-life but realistic. There’s no quick fix, it will take work. The National Dems have done enough damage to the economy – at the end of the day, it is about economy! With no disrepect to the likely new Dem Commissioner, the Dauphin County Commissioners have historically worked well together as a Board, sorry to see a good team broken up.
The GOP is too rigid for modern day America. Shed the flawed market-based principles and outflank the Democrats by proposing a national healthcare system. Conservative governments in E.U. Nations embrace national healthcare. Why can’t the GOP?
Well, incidents in other countries like the UK (even though I know they aren’t in the EU anymore) doesn’t convince GOP to support national healthcare, especially what just happened in the Indi Gregory case and how she was treated as property of the government when her parents fought for better treatment when all medical professionals decided she wasn’t curable, even when Italy stepped in and gave her emergency citizenship, London’s High Court overruled them because they decided it “wasn’t in Indi’s best interest”. This is not the first time this has happened in the UK (Alfie Evans case in 2018 was the same exact story). Cases like these and abuses of Canada’s MAiD program is why opposition to national healthcare still exists.
The map shows the next cluster of counties that will go light blue in the next 10 to 20 years.
Not Lebanon county. Some of the Harrisburg suburbs are moving into the far western part of the county, otherwise it is a far right bible belt county with a dense but small concentrations of Latinos in the city of Lebanon.
Dauphin, Lancaster and Cumberland counties have been losing Republicans for about 20 years now.
The map shows Dauphin County on the northwestern edge of insanity land.