The weekend has come and gone, and we are recapping the top rumors and stories coming out of the receptions.
One of the biggest stories coming out of the PMA seminar was Gubernatorial candidate Scott Wagner’s (R-York) comments going after different candidates in the race.
Wagner reportedly called out all three of his Republican opponents during his remarks, and made pointed criticism of Lieutenant Governor Mike Stack and Governor Tom Wolf.
When discussing his decision to name his LG candidate, Wagner reportedly pointed to Stack while remarking that he “doesn’t even like his running mate.”
On the Republican side, Wagner’s named LG candidate Jeff Bartos is the only candidate officially in the race. That will likely change before the holidays with multiple people saying former state Rep. Gordon Denlinger (R-Lancaster), who did not make the trip up to New York, will be entering the race.
Republican Gubernatorial candidate Paul Mango’s campaign was rumored to have been making calls in the weeks leading up the PA Society looking for a candidate to join his ticket as the LG candidate.
On the Democratic side, while LG candidate Aryanna Berringer did not attend the weekend, state Rep. Madeleine Dean made the rounds of many of the events.
The main event, the PA Society dinner, was held at the Hilton Midtown while the usual Waldorf Astoria is undergoing renovations, causing receptions to be scattered throughout the city. Many speculated that would cause a drop in attendance, but reports from many events were that they had the same or more attendees than usual. Jokingly, some blamed the rumors of low attendance on the Society honoring the Sheetz family, continuing the Sheetz/Wawa divide in the state.
The top overheard quote coming out of the weekend was “Lou Barletta looks like Liberace.”
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9 Responses
How incredibly tone deaf – the PA GOP and its apparatus lost a ton of seats in local elections across the state (especially in the ‘collar county’ areas that had not gone D in decades) in an anti-Trump backlash wave and we are hearing zippo from the party about how they plan to counteract it (it’s not going to go away for the 2018 midterms!) Nope, they are fiddling and celebrating at PA Society while Rome burns. If they don’t figure out how to fix this and inspire their workers, there will be no new governor or LG next year.
What was Lou wearing to prompt that comment?
Wasn’t Toomey in DC screwing the country with his tax vote Friday night?
Ignoring the sarcasm but addressing the actual question you pose concerning Sen. Toomey’s timing, he was indeed on the Senate floor at 2:30 AM or so — and then with 2 hours’ sleep was at the Metropolitan Club for the Saturday morning PMA seminar.
“Attendance Still Strong”? Where are you talking about? The Sixers’ game? Answer Desk’s comments are right on point. There were 800 or less people at the dinner, when prior years were 1500 plus. Friday and the Saturday undercard were many fewer events, so some events may have seemed well attended and some events were in smaller spaces. Lack of a gathering space like the Waldorf lobby was also a problem. Many disliked the “new-look” PA Society and won’t be back.
There were less people there. The events were full because there were less of them and some were in smaller rooms. Without the Waldorf as home base, it became a bar crawl where there was no venue to run into everyone. Very few elected officials this year compared to previous years.
The PA Society folks should find a venue other than a sterile Hilton that was not accommodating for this kind of event. No real central common space. Find a hotel that is old, historic and grand…nothing is as grand as the Waldorf, but there are similar hotels in NY. The Roosevelt perhaps?
Plaza?
There were “fewer” people, not less. Please use proper word usage in your comments. If you can count it, use “fewer”. If it is something that cannot be counted, use “less”. Obviously, people can be counted so the word “fewer” is proper.
Every venue was packed except the energy one and that was due to a fact the room was too big definitely more crowded than last year.