PITTSBURGH — Pittsburgh is recognized as a city of bridges, industry and championship sports teams, and now, in a much newer development, as a powerhouse of progressive politics.
The progressive candidates are in the midst of a revealing winning streak over more moderate Allegheny County Democrats, who for decades had a firm grip on power in Pittsburgh.
In May, progressive State Rep. Sara Innamorato, who began her rise by defeating a left-wing Democratic state legislator in the 2018 primary, has won a hotly contested Democratic race. for county executive, the highest office in the entire county. On the same day, Matt Dugan, a public defender running on a criminal justice reform platform, defeated former District Attorney Stephen Zappala, who had been in power for nearly a quarter century.
Those were the latest in a growing line of victories, including a victory in the US House of Representatives last year by Summer Lee, who, like Innamorato, previously won a state House seat by defeating a Democratic incumbent, and Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey’s defeat of the then-mayor. Bill Peduto in a 2021 primary, among others. Also, Senator John Fetterman, elected last fall as an unabashed progressive, first rose to prominence as the mayor of Braddock, a former steel town about 8 miles from downtown Pittsburgh.
The reasons for the creeping ballot takeover are numerous: a changing economy that has shifted from steel production and heavy industry to education, health care and technology; a plurality of younger voters that has become a force at the polls; a local political establishment that was not organized enough to defend itself against an uprising in both the city neighborhoods and suburban enclaves; and the election of former President Donald Trump, which accelerated the advance of the movement.
And while some believe unique, region-specific factors have helped the rise of the left in ways that would be hard to replicate elsewhere, Allegheny County progressives say their path to power offers a roadmap for how leftist activists can expand their coalition outside the country. the nation’s largest cities.
“People are so surprised that that could come from Pittsburgh,” said Lee, the first black woman elected to the Keystone State Capitol and the Western Pennsylvania State House, “because they’re still thinking about the Pittsburgh of old. , a particular type of fabrication, of steel, of Blue Dog Dems, of white men of a moderate politics”.
“I think the Pittsburgh story is intentionally underplayed,” Lee aggregate. “Because people want you to think that the only place you can win on the progressive message is in an AOC district.”
Plus, progressives here say their efforts to boost turnout among younger voters and voters of color could play a critical role in handing over the battlefield of Pennsylvania to President Joe Biden and Democratic Sen. Bob Casey next year. , noting the progress they have made in recent years. —but particularly in 2022— as proof.
Last fall, the turnout in Allegheny County increased by more than 30,000 votes compared to the 2018 midterms, a cycle that saw staggering turnout across the country midway through Trump’s term. Meanwhile, turnout dropped in Philadelphia County, the state’s most populous, by more than 50,000 votes. Although Philadelphia has more than 200,000 people of voting age than its neighbors on the other side of the state, Allegheny County voters cast an estimated 75,000 additional ballots. That momentum helped Democrats defeat their Republican rivals in statewide races for Senate and governor, as well as for win a local battleground congressional race.
“If you look at Biden in 2020 versus Clinton in 2016, or even if you look at [Gov. Josh] Shapiro and Fetterman in 2022 versus Biden in 2020, it just keeps getting better and better,” said Ethan Smith, a Pittsburgh Democratic pollster. “And a big reason for that is you have these progressive candidates that activate these voters and convert them to huge levels.”
How the change happened
National politicians have tried to use the area as a backdrop to send messages to working class and blue collar voters, evoking its history as a leader in the steel and mining industry. But, as Lee and others have pointed out, this message has mostly glossed over how the region has changed.
The progressive acquisition has coincided with the population shift from younger Allegheny County as the city’s technology-based economy has grown. The share of county residents ages 20-39 increased nearly 3% between the 2010 and 2020 censuses. During that same time, the share of residents ages 40-59 decreased by more than 5%. The reduced rows of traces of Generation X to the collapse of the steel industry in the early 1980s, which decimated the local economy and contributed to a large exodus of people from the county.
Rich Fitzgerald, who has served as Allegheny County executive since 2012 and will leave office after this year’s election, has witnessed the political upheavals firsthand. Fitzgerald said that when he was first elected to the county council more than 20 years ago, “almost every Democrat on the county council and in the state legislature would have been pro-life, a little bit pro-gun and certainly pro.” -unions”.
“And obviously, that has changed,” he said. “You could see the county council, the city council, the state House, the people who have been elected. That change really accelerated when Trump won in 2016. But it was building. He would come anyway.
That change has not been limited to the city. In the leafy suburb of Fox Chapel, where Zappala, the incumbent district attorney, resides, Dugan beat him by more than 10 points in the May primary. Four years earlier, Zappala defeated his main opponent there by 30 points. Innamarato, who emerged at the top of a six-person primary field that included several longtime local officials, won the most districts in Mount Lebanon and Upper St. Clair, two upper-middle-class neighborhoods south of Pittsburgh.
During the campaign, Dugan said she noticed “an energy and a willingness to listen about change in these suburbs, and people really latched on to that.”
“Really, across the county, I think the established Democrats are more afraid of us than the Republican voters are,” Dugan said. “Because they see that we have been able to fight the power of what has been a regime for decades, decades, decades.”
Republicans see an opportunity
However, Republicans see an opportunity here as a result of the progressive impeachment.
About 40% of county voters have backed Republicans in recent years, and the GOP believes it can make headway with independents and moderate Democrats who may be uncomfortable with the creeping takeover. Zapala is set to run on the republican ticket this autumn. In the county executive race, Republican Joe Rockey just picked up an endorsement of a labor union.
“For Republicans, this is a godsend,” Christopher Nicholas, a veteran Republican political adviser from Pennsylvania, said of Innamorato’s victory in the primary. “Because they couldn’t have had a competitive race against any of the three guys. …Republicans have a chance to make the fall race a referendum on Innamorato.”
Mike Mikus, a Pittsburgh-based Democratic strategist who worked on Zappala’s main effort but no longer works with him, said he’s curious to see how Allegheny County’s new leadership may affect voting trends in surrounding counties. , which are Republican strongholds.
“Will it make the other counties redder?” he said. “Because what you’re going to see on the local news is the enactment of progressive policies.”
If Innamorato and Dugan prevail this fall, progressive strategists say voters could see a expanded fracking ban, changes to the budget process, criminal justice reforms, and raising the minimum wage for county employees. As one city strategist put it: “The door is wide open for almost anything.”
But Lee said that for new progressive leaders, the overall priority is giving new and underrepresented voices a seat at the table.
“For a long time, the people who were winning were people who were in debt to the people who were funding them and had vested interests in certain areas,” he said. “And Mon Valley and Homewood and communities like the Hill district will never be able to compete, but that doesn’t mean they don’t deserve to be represented.”
