Voters handed control of the U.S. Senate to Republicans Tuesday, although the contests in several battleground states won by Donald Trump were still too close to call Wednesday morning.
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As the presidential race increasingly appears to be shifting towards Trump, some down-ballot races seem to be following suit, bolstering the already strong prospects of a Republican-held Senate in the next Congress.
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Behind closed doors and in public appearances, GOP leaders are raising the alarm over the commanding monetary lead Democrats have built up as November’s election inches closer.
Democrats had an advertisement spending advantage in nearly every competitive Senate race as of August and the Congressional Leadership Fund, the primary super PAC aimed at electing Republicans to the House, is $70 million behind its Democratic counterpart in ad spending, according to Politico. The situation has high-ranking Republicans making public and private pleas to big-dollar donors in an attempt to close the financial gap before voters head to the polls in November.
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U.S. Pennsylvania Senate nominee Dave McCormick on Friday raised the possibility of White House officials using the 25th Amendment to remove President Joe Biden from office due to poor physical fitness due to his poor debate performance on Thursday.
McCormick suggested White House officials consider the 25th Amendment during an appearance on KDKA NewsRadio in Pittsburgh.
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The prevailing belief in the Democratic Party is that abortion will again be a potent issue against Republicans in this year’s election cycle just as it was in 2022 – and that this time it will not just cost the GOP gaining the majority in the U.S. Senate, but also give Democrats the upper hand in retaining the presidency and winning back the House.
Abortion rights put the brakes on the Republicans’ chances in 2022 when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, eliminating the constitutional right to abortion after almost 50 years; a decision that transformed American politics that year, benefiting Democrats who were on their way to a bruising midterm election defeat.
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Kathy Barnette, a Republican former U.S. Senate candidate from Pennsylvania, hinted on Monday at possibly supporting primary winner Mehmet Oz, something she previously refused to do.
An Army Reserve veteran, political commentator and former adjunct finance professor who lives in Huntingdon Valley — a Montgomery County town neighboring Bryn Athyn where Oz lives — Barnette earlier balked at voting for the celebrity surgeon. On Primary Election Day, May 17, the eventual third-place finisher declared she had “no intentions of supporting globalists,” referring to Oz and fellow top-tier candidate Dave McCormick.
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Pennsylvania GOP Senate candidate and hedge fund CEO David McCormick on Friday conceded the race to his Trump-backed opponent, reality star Dr. Mehmet Oz.
McCormick on Friday announced that he had called Oz to concede the race after it became clear he would lose the extremely tight race, per the Associated Press. The race is still going through an automatic recount.
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The Supreme Court on Tuesday paused the count of some mail-in ballots that could impact the Pennsylvania Senate GOP primary race.
The order temporarily blocks a lower court’s ruling that instructed election officials to count mail-in ballots that arrived on time but were undated.
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Attorneys for Senate candidate Dave McCormick on Monday found themselves in the atypical position of arguing in Commonwealth Court alongside Pennsylvania’s Democratic Secretary of State about which ballots to count.
The Republican and former hedge-fund executive is challenging the vote-counting standard that has determined the gap of 922 votes between him and his leading primary opponent, celebrity surgeon Mehmet Oz.
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The Republican National Committee joined Pennsylvania’s Republican Party this week in a legal effort to effectively help Mehmet Oz sew up last Tuesday’s Senate primary election battle against rival Dave McCormick.
As of Tuesday afternoon, McCormick is 982 votes behind the celebrity surgeon, though vote counting hasn’t concluded. Tuesday marked the final day that absentee military ballots could arrive at their respective counties and still get counted. What impact those final military votes will have on the race remains to be seen, though it bears observing that McCormick himself served in the U.S. Army and noted that fact well throughout his campaign.
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The determination of Pennsylvania’s unsettled Republican Senate nomination battle between Mehmet Oz and Dave McCormick could depend on a federal court decision regarding undated mail-in ballots.
As of Sunday afternoon, Oz held 418,535 votes to McCormick’s 417,465, putting the former ahead by far less than the 0.5 percent maximum gap that triggers an automatic recount. While over 99 percent of all ballots cast in the election have been counted, an ongoing dispute about whether undated absentee ballots should be deemed valid has the potential to erase Oz’s lead.
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The Pennsylvania Republican Senate primary is still too close to call and likely headed for a recount which could delay the declaration of a winner into mid-June.
Per the Associated Press, Dr. Mehmet Oz currently holds a narrow 1,079 vote lead over rival David McCormick, amounting to 0.08% of the 1,340,248 total votes.
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Pennsylvania’s Republican Senate primary between celebrity surgeon Mehmet Oz and former hedge-fund chief executive officer Dave McCormick remains unresolved the day after voters went to the polls.
As of Wednesday afternoon, Oz leads McCormick by 1,610 votes out of more than 1.3 million votes cast for GOP Senate nominee in total. Oz has 410,822, or 31.29 percent of the vote while McCormick has 409,212 or 31.17 percent. The insurgent candidacy of veteran and political commentator Kathy Barnette gained 323,700 or 24.66 percent while four other candidates split the rest of the vote.
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Pennsylvania Republicans on Tuesday gave State Senator Doug Mastriano (R-Gettysburg) the nod to face state Attorney General Josh Shapiro (D) in the race for governor this year.
The Democratic Party also nominated Lt. Gov. John Fetterman (D) for the Senate seat from which Republican Pat Toomey will retire at the end of 2022. At this writing, the GOP primary contest for that seat remains too close to call between top-tier candidates David McCormick and Mehmet Oz.
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A new poll shows the GOP primary race for U.S. Senate from Pennsylvania continues to be tight, but with Kathy Barnette now inching ahead of David McCormick to reach second place behind Mehmet Oz.
Barnette, an army veteran and political commentator, is polling at 23.2 percent. Oz, the celebrity surgeon, received 24.5 percent and former hedge-fund executive McCormick got 21.6 percent.
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As the midterm elections approach, a number of important party primary races have yet to determine a nominee.
Many of the races still don’t have a clear frontrunner, despite fast-approaching election dates and millions of dollars spent, increasing the importance of every decision made until voting begins.
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Internal polling shows Pennsylvania Senate candidate Mehmet Oz surging past rival David McCormick by 10 points, according to sources close to the candidate’s campaign not authorized to talk to the press.
McCormick, a former hedge-fund executive and former undersecretary of the Treasury under George W. Bush, spent several weeks as the frontrunner in the Republican primary that will be decided on May 17, but recent public polls showed Oz quickly closing that gap.
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New polling shows Mehmet Oz pulling slightly ahead of David McCormick in the Republican Pennsylvania Senate primary for the first time since the latter announced his run in January.
The latest Franklin & Marshall College (F&M) Poll, conducted from March 30 to April 10, showed Oz with 16 percent of support among 317 registered Republicans compared with McCormick’s 15 percent, a statistical tie. Yet another survey by the Republican-aligned Trafalgar Group conducted between April 10 and 13 found Oz leading 22.7 percent to 19.7 percent among 1,074 polled Republicans, just slightly outside the 2.99-percent margin of error. The latter polling took place after former President Donald Trump endorsed the celebrity surgeon two Saturdays ago.
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In the day since Donald Trump endorsed celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz for Senate in Pennsylvania Saturday evening, many supporters of the former president criticized the move.
Even Sean Parnell, the Pittsburgh-area Army veteran who had Trump’s endorsement in the Republican primary until dropping out last November, expressed disappointment with the erstwhile chief executive via Twitter on Sunday.
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HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania— In a straw poll of conservative activists from across Pennsylvania last weekend, Kathy Barnette, Doug Mastriano, Bill McSwain and Clarice Schillinger finished ahead for the statewide offices they’re seeking. About half of the nearly 800 attendees from all around the Keystone State (and a few from nearby states) participated in the annual survey at the Pennsylvania Leadership Conference (PLC) in Camp Hill, just across the river from Harrisburg. Information-technology expert Scott R. Davis oversaw the survey and discussed the results with attendees Saturday afternoon. Barnette, a veteran and political commentator, earned 35 percent of votes cast for that office at the gathering throughout Friday and Saturday. Her fellow Montgomery Countian, real-estate developer Jeff Bartos, came in second with 17.8 percent. Former Ambassador Carla Sands and former hedge-fund executive David McCormick both received roughly 14 percent and celebrity surgeon Mehmet Oz got 12 percent. “I did have the opportunity to listen to the majority of the [GOP] Senate candidates,” Davis said, “and I will echo what I heard before I stepped on the stage. And each and every one of these candidates is going to be better than the candidate the other side puts up.” Pennsylvania will hold…
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Mehmet Oz, the celebrity doctor who’s running for Senate from Pennsylvania, is denying reports that he is in discussions to return to television and suggested opponent David McCormick is behind the rumor.
The entertainment site Radar Online reported Tuesday that inside sources said that while Oz aims to win the May 17 Republican primary and the November 8 election for retiring Sen. Pat Toomey’s (R) seat, he’s working on reviving his broadcast career in case he doesn’t prevail.
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While Republican Pennsylvania Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz has billed himself as a staunch opponent of big corporations, his ties to major technology and pharmaceutical corporations complicate his campaign rhetoric.
Oz, who announced his candidacy in late November, is running for the empty Senate seat left by retiring Republican Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey. The celebrity doctor has made opposition to major technology and pharmaceutical companies a hallmark of his campaign, pitching his experience working in television and exposing scams as an example of his anti-corporate positions.
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