'Nation's eyes are on us': Pa. in swing-state spotlight as Biden accepts nomination, Trump stumps near Scranton

Joe Biden aimed to rally American voters remotely during his address broadcast Thursday night, capping off the Democratic Party’s first all-virtual convention and four days of speeches equating voting for Biden as a vote to save democracy itself.

“This is a life-changing election that will determine America’s future for a very long time,” Biden said as he officially accepted the Democratic presidential nomination. “Character is on the ballot. Compassion is on the ballot. Decency, science, democracy. They are all on the ballot.”

Hours earlier, in an attempt at a prebuttal to Biden’s scheduled remarks, President Trump boarded Air Force One and headed to northeastern Pennsylvania to host an in-person rally outside Mariotti Building Products — a short drive from Biden’s childhood home. Flanked by big rigs and banners splashed with “Make America Great Again!” and “Jobs! Jobs! Jobs!,” Trump likened Biden to a “puppet of the radical left that seeks to destroy the American way of life,” and accused his Democratic challenger of having “abandoned” the steel industry and his hometown of Scranton.

“He left, like, 70 years ago,” Trump said. Biden left Scranton at age 10 when his father moved the family to Delaware.

Trump’s derision clashed sharply with remarks expressed repeatedly over the four-day Democratic National Convention that Biden has remained loyal to Pennsylvania and its working class for years, despite his recent decision to avoid travel during the covid-19 pandemic.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, D-Scranton, credited Biden prior to Trump’s visit with having “the values and the spirit of Scranton in his heart.”

“I’ve known Joe almost 30 years,” U.S. Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Forest Hills, said during a Zoom call as part of the local convention program. He recalled how Biden’s frequent appearances in Pittsburgh’s annual Labor Day parades in prior years would extend the events by an hour or more because Biden was so popular and sociable. “In Western Pennsylvania, when someone says he’s one of us, that’s the ultimate compliment. He understands our struggles.”

‘We want this state’

Trump’s campaign stop in northeastern Pennsylvania on the final night of the Democrats’ convention, following visits earlier this week to Wisconsin and Arizona, speaks to how badly both parties hope to win over voters in the commonwealth this time around. To secure Pennsylvania’s 20 electoral votes, Trump needs to retain or expand his slim 2016 lead of 44,000 votes, and Biden must close the gap by reaching out to wavering Republicans and getting more people in general to vote.

“We love this state,” Trump said as he greeted his Old Forge audience Thursday afternoon. “We want this state.”

Leaders of both major parties are targeting Pennsylvania voters in force. Trump field workers are knocking on doors, equipped with masks and hand sanitizer, in rural and suburban areas where they want to strengthen footholds, including Westmoreland County.

Democratic leaders at all levels used many of this week’s convention meetings to invoke a sense of urgency and warn one another not to take for granted that Biden will clinch his native state.

“Not necessarily the Philly burbs, not necessarily Allegheny County, but in a lot of the smaller pockets of the state … there’s more votes out there, and the president has actually welcomed new voters to our side,” said Michael Joyce, deputy press secretary for the Republican National Committee. “The never-Trumpers remain never-Trumpers,” said Joyce, “but I think there’s a lot of people who feel left behind by the Democratic Party.”

New Jersey U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, who ended his bid for the presidency in January, said Thursday that in his view, no other U.S. state may carry as much weight.

“The battles in your state are so important,” Booker told the participants on the Pennsylvania Democratic Party’s virtual breakfast call, the final such event of the convention. “I know people like to think of Florida or Arizona, but I think the swing state of them all right now is the great state of Pennsylvania.”

Local politicians with speaking slots on the same Zoom call agreed. They urged fellow Democrats to spread out to persuade people to vote for Biden, even though doing so can be challenging amid a pandemic, suggesting using everything from social media to in-person interactions when they can do so safely.

“This is the election of our lives,” said Aliquippa Mayor Dwan Walker, citing pride as Beaver County’s first Black mayor just as Kamala Harris makes history as the first Black woman on a major-party presidential ticket. “The world is listening, and they’re looking at Pennsylvania to see where we’re going to go.”

Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald — who reaped a surprise visit from Biden during his reelection victory party at a union headquarters last year in Pittsburgh’s South Side — said the electorate should be reinvigorated with hope with Harris on the ticket. He spoke of “that feeling in the pit of our stomachs” in November 2016 when they realized that “in our state, in the Keystone State, that for the first time since 1988, we weren’t blue.”

“We’ve got to make sure we’re blue this time,” Fitzgerald said. “The nation’s eyes are on us, the world is counting on us to make sure that America again becomes the beacon of who we can be.”

Winning Pa. critical for Trump

In 2016, Trump flipped historically blue areas red by appealing to working-class voters that felt neglected or unimpressed by Hillary Clinton, said G. Terry Madonna, director of the Center for Politics and Public Affairs at Franklin & Marshall College.

Observers say he’ll need to do so again if he wants a shot at a second term.

“Biden could probably still win without Pennsylvania,” said Tim Vercellotti, political science professor and director of the Polling Institute at Western New England University. “It’s very hard to see President Trump winning without Pennsylvania.”

Said Madonna, “For Trump to win, he must rally that base that elected him.”

Biden, meanwhile, has gained an edge in suburbs that have shifted from Republican to Democrat with an influx of college-educated white voters, particularly women, in line with trends in Ohio and Michigan. He’s also making progress attracting more “white voters without college degrees who are relying on blue-collar jobs and who are feeling left behind,” Vercellotti said.

“They were an important part of the Trump coalition in 2016,” he said, “and we’re seeing Biden make some inroads with that group.”

Republican leaders argue Trump strongholds remain around the state and support is growing in some areas, buoyed by GOP platforms such as promoting more natural gas industry development and deregulating businesses. Joyce said he expects Democratic wins in recent years to fade now that Trump is back on the ticket as an incentive for more likely Republicans to vote.

“I’ve been out here all week; The energy is electric,” Joyce said. “Of course, it was a close race in 2016 … so without a doubt, this is one of the biggest battleground states in the country.”

The campaign has more than 120 staff working in the field in Pennsylvania and has made contacts with more than 5 million voters statewide, according to Joyce. He cited Sean Parnell — Republican challenger to U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb, D-Mt. Lebanon — as an example of “an absolute rising star and a rock star candidate in our party right now.”

“We are holding in-person events, we are campaigning and we are out knocking on doors,” Joyce said. “The advantage that we have on the ground and the staff and the investment that we’ve made in the state, I think it’s really hard for Team Biden to come up here at the 11th hour and play catch up right now.”

Biden leads with slim margins statewide

Recent polling suggests that the race remains closer than should give either party comfort.

An Allentown Morning Call/Muhlenberg poll published Thursday found Biden holding a lead of 4 percentage points over Trump statewide, with 49% saying they intend to vote for Biden and 45% backing Trump, with 4% who remain undecided.

A majority of likely voters said that Trump does not deserve re-election and rated Trump’s response to the covid-19 crisis as “poor” — but as was the case with Trump, more voters had unfavorable views on Biden (46%) than favorable ones (39%). Fifty-one percent reported unfavorable views on Trump, and 42% had favorable ones.

A July 26-30 survey by F&M College found that Trump voters were more enthusiastic about Trump than Biden supporters were about Biden.

“I think Joe Biden has a serious enthusiasm issue, even out here in Pennsylvania. For the so-called ‘son of Scranton,’ you just don’t see the energy and excitement around the state like you do for President Trump,” Joyce said. “I was in Wilkes-Barre, I was in Williamsport, we’re going to be headed to Philly and in Pittsburgh in the next couple days here. … People are fired up and there’s a lot of energy on the ground.”

Said Booker on Thursday, “I’m not going to be exhaling until I watch Joe Biden swear that oath.”