Kelly Anne Conway just said Oz didn’t win because of crap candidate for Gov Mastriano. That sounds more likely.
NBC calling Pennsylvania for Fetterman.
NBC is calling it for Fetterman.
Sorry, but she’s wrong.
Mastriano ran a lousy campaign, and had no support from the establishment, but Oz didn’t lose because of that.
Understand the fundamentals... OZ was a crap off brand candidate who ran a poor campaign to boot. The Governors race wasn’t even on the radar, blaming Mastriano for OZ losing is nonsense.
More than $100 Million dollars was spent to sell OZ in the general election, and ungodly sum of money.. he spent more on the Primary that both candidates combined did last general to wind up with 31% of the primary vote... he was an absolute off brand and crap candidate. This entire cycle has been driven by the Senate race, no one was talking about the Governors race, it was a non factor in anything.. because it was never a race... Turnout wasn’t low for the election so saying oh the governors race wasn’t competitive that’s why he lost is just not based in reality IMHO.
Would a more competitive governors race gotten OZ 3 more points? I really don’t see how... Its clear voters split their vote.. Mastriano got over 200k fewer votes than OZ, voters split their ballots... Turnout was not repressed, overall turnout was insanely high for a midterm, blaming a poor governors race is just an excuse.
OZ was a CRAP off brand candidate, period. PA Senate was an absolutely preventable and unforced error. Absolutely ZERO excitement for this man anywhere, anywhere. I cannot tell you of a single conversation I’ve had with any conservative or MAGA voter I have talked to, let alone independent or conservative democrat, that offered ANY, ANY sign of excitement or enthusiasm at all for OZ, not one, not ever.
The general conversation when this Senate race has been brought up among folks with those leanings has been pretty much, “What an absolute joke this election is”. That’s it, in a nutshell, that wasn’t going to change regardless of whether we had the best candidate for Governor or the worst...
This race was an absolute preventable and unforced error, and reality is, money pumped into this race to try to buy it for OZ probably prevented other candidates who could have won from winning elsewhere had the money been spent there.