In his climb to the presidency, Donald Trump managed to grab 209 US counties that had voted twice for Barack Obama. Each county flipped for reasons all its own.

But the overall phenomenon – of Trump eating the Democrats’ lunch in Obama districts – raised a basic question about the future of American politics: were those county results an aberration, or did they reveal an enduring shift?

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Eight months into the Trump presidency, a concrete test of that question is now under way, in the form of a race in Pennsylvania to replace a retiring congressman who is both a Republican – a member of the president’s own party – and a personal opponent of the president.

As a moderate dealmaker who was re-elected six times with strong Democratic support, Charlie Dent did not need to get along with Trump to stay in Washington. But Dent’s surprise announcement earlier this month that he would not run for re-election has been viewed as a symptom of the Trump era, in which pragmatic leaders are expunged and fringe elements swarm in.

The last straw for Dent may have been a showdown last March, when he refused to go along with the White House on healthcare reform, and Trump reportedly accused him of “destroying the Republican party”. Trump loves a grudge and would likely have had his knives out for Dent in an election year.

“It seemed like for personal reasons it was the right time to go,” said Dent. “Yes, there’s frustration, but some of that frustration predated the Trump administration, to be honest.”



Now, both parties are sharpening their strategies to fill the Dent-shaped hole in the 15th congressional district, which is scheduled to hold primary elections next May. What kind of candidate can win? A moderate like Dent? Or perhaps even a Democrat? Or is the way clear for a more ferocious, more Trump-like option?

Hanging over the race, inevitably, is the looming shadow of the president. Trump won the 15th by eight points last November. The district is anchored in Northampton County, one of those to flip for Trump after voting twice for Obama. The Guardian has been reporting from Northampton since the election for our series The Promise, which explores whether Trump voters think he is delivering.

In interviews over the last week with six declared and potential candidates to replace Dent, one thing becomes clear: despite the president’s low approval ratings, the Republican candidates are not running away from Trump here in the Lehigh Valley, and the Democrats, with a high-stakes opportunity to pick up a suddenly open seat, are not running against him.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Congressman Charlie Dent at his residence in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Mark Makela/The Guardian

“I don’t think the response in this district can be, ‘Donald Trump is a terrible president, and you should hate him, and all these people who voted for him are stupid’,” said Rich Wilkins, a Democratic state committee member from the area. “If that’s our response, we will lose. We might have a lot of excited activists. But that’s not gonna win this seat.”

After their shock at Trump’s victory last November, many progressives continue to hope and believe that Trump’s performance in office will backfire for his party, leading to a Democratic wave in the 2018 midterm elections, perhaps even to Democratic majorities in Congress, and from there (the scenario runs) to an impeachment of the president.

No such scenario contemplates Trump’s re-election in 2020. But that represents a potential blind spot, according to interviews in the Lehigh Valley.

“I would not discount the potential that he [Trump] gets re-elected down the road,” said John Morganelli, the longtime district attorney in Northampton, a well-liked Democrat and a potential (though undeclared) candidate to replace Dent. “I think it’s going to be a harder race next time. But it all depends on who the Democrats select – I mean you can’t beat somebody with nobody.”

A strong sign of Democratic traction in the region would be a successful flip of Dent’s district, which was gerrymandered in 2011 to give it a Republican tilt. It could happen: Lehigh Valley voters are notoriously promiscuous when it comes to party identity, and some of the seemingly strongest potential candidates in the race – Morganelli, or state senator Lisa Boscola (also undeclared) – are locally popular, centrist Democrats who break with the party orthodoxy on issues like immigration and abortion.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest John Morganelli at the courthouse in Easton, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Mark Makela/The Guardian

The first voting is eight months away, and national or global events may remake the local calculus. Dent himself thinks the race could go either way.

“The district has a slight Republican lean, although in a year like this where one party has control – my party has control of the executive and legislative branches – that party typically runs into a pretty stiff headwind,” he said. “So I suspect now that the seat is open there will be a considerable amount of investment by both sides in trying to capture it. I believe this will be a very competitive race.”

‘No place for moderates’

Voters who liked Dent for his contrast with Trumpian politics might not like what comes next in the 15th district, warned G Terry Madonna, director of the center for politics and public affairs at Pennsylvania’s Franklin and Marshall College.

“There’s no place for moderates given what redistricting has done and then the increasing polarization of the American electorate,” Madonna said. “And Dent was the last of a dying breed.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Justin Simmons at his residence in Coopersburg, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Mark Makela/The Guardian

One member of the new breed is Justin Simmons, a Tea Party-aligned, 31-year-old state representative who accused Dent of having been a “Trojan horse” Republican.

“There’s going to be a battle for the soul of the Republican party in the primary,” Simmons said, casting himself as a keeper of the true flame. And Simmons seems to have won over the local Republican vanguard.

“Simmons is a fighter. He’s guns blazing, he’s a true conservative, he’s out there,” said Lee Snover, a Republican activist who was an extremely early adopter of Trump and Trumpism. “He has zero attachment to establishment.”

“I kind of was Donald Trump before Donald Trump was popular,” said Simmons, describing his successful ejection at age 23 of a less-strident Republican from office. “I kind of created the model on how to do this, and we’ve been successful every time.”

Simmons’ main Republican adversary so far in the race, which more candidates are expected to enter, is fellow state representative Ryan Mackenzie, 35, who also embraces Trump, if slightly less adamantly.

“We’ve been talking about issues like the president has for years at the local level,” Mackenzie said. “I think the people in the 15th district are looking for someone who is going to work with the president to come up with solutions to those problems. I want to be a constructive partner and try to make positive changes.”

Trump’s broad policy prescriptions remain locally popular, said Dean Browning, a business executive, Tea Party activist and possible Republican candidate.

“I think a candidate that takes some of the positions that Donald Trump took – which is national security, redoing our free trade agreements, producing jobs for Americans, rebuilding our military – I think that will resonate not only with Republicans but with Democrats and independents as well,” Browning said.

While no one seems to want to attack Trump, it’s clearly open season on Congress, including for Republicans, whose party is currently in charge.

“There is no doubt that the failure to repeal and replace Obamacare lies at the feet of Congress,” said Mackenzie. “You can’t frame it any other way.”



The right Democrat

Sensing Trump’s staying power in eastern Pennsylvania, Democrats don’t see a full-frontal race against Trump’s record as a winning plan. And they are warning the national party not to try to force a candidate on the district who toes the party line on every issue, especially immigration and abortion.

“We have to come up with somebody that’s gonna be, I think, a moderate Democrat who’s OK on Democratic issues but maybe not be a purist, and who is not going to be susceptible to being painted as a leftwing kook,” said district attorney Morganelli, who has personally tried 25 first-degree murder cases to verdict. “Because this district is not going to vote for a leftwing kook.”

“We don’t want Pelosi doing a rally here the night before the election,” said Wilkins, the party operative, referring to the polarizing House minority leader.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Lisa Boscola by City Hall in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Mark Makela/The Guardian

“They’ve always split tickets in the Lehigh Valley, and voters look for the person who best represents them,” said Boscola, 55, an elected official with more than 20 years’ experience and the only woman with a leadership role in the state senate. “Because they’re frustrated with both parties, and they’re not really tied to any particular ideology.

“They’ll probably think about a Democrat, if that Democrat is moderate to some extent, and has their values, to counterbalance Trump – they’re like ‘OK, well, maybe he isn’t the best, but he does have Congress to work with, and the Senate, and that’s where the balance is’.”

Greg Edwards, 47, founder of the Resurrected Life Church in Allentown, Pennsylvania, who was already planning to run on the Democratic side before Dent announced he was stepping down, had sharp criticism for Trump over his handling of racist violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, and other issues.

“The president’s inability to address what happen in Charlottesville is beyond unnerving,” said Edwards. “That we have a president who actually gave right-of-way to white supremacy and white nationalism – that’s beyond being a Democrat or a Republican.”

But “I’m not running against Donald Trump,” said Edwards, whose platform includes better public education and higher wages.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Pastor Gregory Edwards at his residence in Orefield, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Mark Makela/The Guardian

“Donald Trump is the president of the United States. I’m running for the people of the 15th congressional district, who at one time voted for Barack Obama, but then turned around and voted for Trump.

“Now that tells you something about this area. I think what we need in the Lehigh Valley is someone who allows us to see the humanity of other people, who historically have been different and distinct.”

Democrat Bill Leiner, a former steelworker and nurse, is also in the race, and the Republican side could yet draw a big name such as former Olympian Marty Nothstein, county commissioner Mike Pries or state senator Pat Browne.

“The Lehigh Valley is sort of a relic, politically,” said Wilkins. “There still is crossover voting, there’s still people who don’t just vote a party line. But I’m not sure why we’d be that special that we won’t change like the rest of the country.”

The race to replace Dent might not end up being reflective of a national trend. Or, on the other hand, like the presidential result in Northampton county last November, the victor of the race could indicate the national course ahead.

Will it be an insurgent candidate like Simmons, who would seem more at home than Dent in Trump’s America, eager to prise at the partisan divide? Or will a moderate Democrat pick up the seat as part of a wave that could signal a national rejection of Trump and even sweep him from Washington?



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For Democrats to swipe the seat from Republicans, Boscola said, potential candidates including herself need to make a decision soon, and then rally behind the strongest candidate.

“And I’m trying to put that together as well,” she said. “Get Democrats together that have talked about running, because there’s a few, and sit down and say, ‘All right, who’s it going to be?’ and let’s get going.

“Because we’re not going to win this without a solid party behind us. It just won’t happen. We can’t be splintered.”