Stunning outcome in special election
Special elections can often work as a barometer for measuring voter enthusiasm better than your average poll, though it’s often better to be able to look at several of them happening closely together to look at which party overperforms based on voter registration data. Obviously, these are low turnout affairs that can only tell us so much – but averages can give us a gauge on who is turning out to vote and more importantly, what’s turning them out to vote.
On Tuesday night, Pennsylvania held two state senate races in Trump-friendly parts of the Keystone State. Lancaster County should have been a seat that Republicans could rest easy about – as the SD-35 district voted for Donald Trump in November by 15 points. It’s also not for lack of trying, as Elon Musk financed several town hall events in the district for Republican candidate Josh Parsons. The result was Parsons losing to Democrat James Malone by just under a point – a 16-point overperformance for Democrats, which means that Republicans can’t always rely on their rural strength – particularly when Donald Trump isn’t on the ballot.
Malone specifically pointed to Elon Musk’s DOGE as a concern that he would fight back against – particularly when it came to cutting benefits for veterans and retirees – and even went so far as to declare the election as a choice between the values of Lancaster and those of Elon Musk. This is an early, but prominent sign that the rhetoric against Elon Musk by calling him the de facto president and pointing out his overreach – are in fact working. The more you call it out, the more people are starting to take notice, and they’re voting against it.
James Sullivan is the assistant editor of Brain World Magazine and an advocate of science-based policy making