Was it the start of a new week? A new month? A return from summer vacation? Or something else?

Pennsylvania saw two more candidate announcements on Monday with Kevin Dellicker’s announcement for U.S. Congress and Dave Sunday’s announcement for PA Attorney General.

We await a formal announcement from Maria Montero for Congress as well, as the former Corbett administration official has filed her paperwork for a run at PA-07. And Roll Call hints that state Rep. Ryan Mackenzie (R-Lehigh) could also still run in that district as well.

Is there something special about the month of July for these announcements?

Well, yes.

Campaign launches are typically methodical and intentional. They might be one of the only things a candidate can control over the course of a race, so campaigns and consultants spend plenty of time crafting the rollout, weighing multiple factors, and most importantly, the date.

One of the first rules for campaign launches is to announce at the beginning of a quarter. Sen. Bob Casey Jr. formally announced his bid for a fourth term back on April 10 – at the start of the second quarter.

Now that the first half of 2023 is behind us, announcements are made now to ensure that campaigns have as close to three full months to raise money as possible – especially since we media judge candidates (probably unfairly) on their quarterly numbers.

We could also see announcements timed for early October and the start of Q4 as well.

Candidate announcements are meant to get the biggest bang for the buck, so that rules out Fridays. Why? Fridays are the best day of the week to release “bad” news to hide it from major attention as we head into a weekend. Media “dumps” if you will.

With that in mind, campaigns target Mondays or Tuesdays for their announcements for the most play online or over the airwaves.

The Fourth of July holiday is never good for such announcements, as hot dogs, hamburgers, other grilled delicacies and cold beverages usually take precedence over paying attention to political news.

So, avoiding July 1-4, and focusing on a Monday or Tuesday leads us to July 10-11 as target dates. And the date selected by two PA campaigns to share the news with the Commonwealth.

Just so you know … we’re not alone. In addition to Dellicker, 10 more congressional candidates around the country announced their intentions yesterday in Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, Ohio, Oregon, Texas, and Wisconsin.