McCain’s path to victory likely runs through PA, a state that no Republican has won in two decades. McCain's path to victory through Pa.

Facing seemingly limited options for getting to an Electoral College majority, John McCain’s path to victory likely runs through Pennsylvania, a state that no Republican presidential candidate has won in two decades, a state in which he trails in the polls by a wide margin and a state where in the past year more than a half-million new Democrats have been added to the voter registration rolls.

It’s an unenviable position to be in, except for one thing: Nearly everyone in a position to know thinks the race for Pennsylvania’s 21 electoral votes is considerably tighter than what recent polls reveal.


“There’s a tendency in Pennsylvania for the polls to change dramatically in the final days,” says John Brabender, a top Republican political consultant based in Pittsburgh. “In the governor’s race in 2002, there were polls just a few days out showing [Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell] with a 25-point lead and he ended up losing 50 of 67 counties and won by nine points.”



“I don’t believe there’s a double-digit lead,” said Jon Delano, a western Pennsylvania-based political analyst who also serves as an adjunct professor of Public Policy and Politics at Carnegie Mellon University. “The history of the presidential elections here is different.”

Even top Democrats concede that McCain’s deficit in the polls — 11 percentage points, according to the latest Real Clear Politics polling average — isn’t a solid indicator of his chances of carrying the state. On Tuesday, CNN reported that an anxious Rendell had sent two recent memos to the Obama campaign requesting that the Democratic nominee spend more time campaigning in Pennsylvania.

“The polls don’t necessarily reflect what will happen on Election Day,” said T.J. Rooney, the state Democratic Party chairman. “We’re not a state that’s accustomed to huge blowouts.”

Indeed, John F. Kerry carried Pennsylvania in 2004 by just 144,000 votes out of nearly 6 million votes cast. His win was powered, to a large degree, by an enormous 412,000-vote margin out of Philadelphia.

The McCain campaign's formula for winning the state begins with the notion that, despite voter registration gains and strong support for Obama in Philadelphia, it would be difficult to wring more votes out of the state’s largest city than the Kerry campaign did.

They even believe they can carry a few of the heavily Democratic city’s 66 wards, a feat George W. Bush was unable to accomplish in 2004.

“We’re not convinced they can blow it out again,” said a McCain campaign source.

And in the four populous and historically Republican collar counties surrounding Philadelphia, the campaign believes McCain is a far better fit for the socially moderate suburbs than President Bush.

“McCain is more like a [Tom] Ridge than a Bush,” said the McCain campaign insider, referring to the popular former two-term GOP governor. “That gives suburban voters a comfort level with him. He’s a different kind of Republican in so many ways.”

Yet Republican hopes aren’t predicated on a southeastern Pennsylvania-based strategy since McCain is unlikely to run dramatically better than Bush in that vote-rich region.

Rather, the GOP path to victory runs through the socially conservative parts of the state outside the Philadelphia metropolitan region, and bears a strong resemblance to Hillary Clinton’s winning Democratic primary map.

“How do you flip 140,000 votes? You start by cutting in places like Lackawanna and Luzerne counties,” said the McCain campaign source, referring to Scranton and Wilkes-Barre, the traditionally conservative Democratic population hubs of northeastern Pennsylvania.

McCain also must run well in Lancaster and York counties in central Pennsylvania, two Republican strongholds that have received attention from both the Arizona senator and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. McCain also needs to boost his margins in the state’s Republican “T”, a region which begins at the Maryland state line and runs north through the center of the state before expanding to include the northern tier of counties that border New York.

“Winning Philadelphia is not enough for a done deal,” said Delano. “Whether it’s Scranton, Erie, Altoona, Johnstown or the Pittsburgh area, this is a big state. What McCain is counting on is that a lot of Democrats who voted once against Barack Obama in the primary will vote against him again.”

Western Pennsylvania, many pols believe, seems to hold the most promise for the McCain campaign. McCain expects to run better than Bush in Pittsburgh’s Allegheny County—which Kerry carried by 97,000 votes in 2004—and in southwestern Pennsylvania, where Obama lost to Clinton by landslide margins.

“Democrats who do well in areas like Johnstown, Wilkes-Barre and Pittsburgh are pro-life, pro-gun Democrats like Bob Casey. The Democrats who seem to do poorly in those areas tend to be pro-choice and questionable on guns,” said Brabender. “I think people are going to be shocked by how well McCain is going to do on the western side and in the center part of the state.”

While Democrats acknowledge western Pennsylvania is highly competitive, they remain confident that Obama will carry the state in the end.

“Pennsylvania will be won or lost for Barack Obama in the Philly suburbs,” said state Rep. Josh Shapiro of suburban Philadelphia’s Montgomery County, the third-largest county in the state after Philadelphia and Allegheny counties. “I anticipate the race will be close and in single digits but I also anticipate that Barack Obama will prevail.”

Rooney, the state Democratic chairman, framed it another way.

“It’s going to get closer,” he said. “But at the end of the day, I would much rather be on the side of the lead I think we have than on the other side of it.”