With Pennsylvania\u2019s primary election quickly approaching this Tuesday, May 19, voters across the commonwealth have the opportunity to nominate their party\u2019s candidates for November\u2019s midterm elections.\u00a0<\/p>\n
At the top of the ticket, Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro and Republican Pennsylvania Treasurer Stacy Garrity<\/a> are running unopposed in their primary races and will square off against one another in the fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n Shapiro, whose name is on a shortlist of potential presidential candidates in 2028, is running for reelection and has amassed a significant fundraising advantage<\/a> over his opponent.\u00a0<\/p>\n According to campaign finance reports, Shapiro ended the most recent filing period, ending in late March, with a $36 million<\/a> advantage over Garrity when it comes to the amount of cash on hand the two sides have.\u00a0<\/p>\n Aside from the governor\u2019s race, all 203 Pennsylvania House seats and 25 of 50 Pennsylvania Senate seats are up for election. Democrats, who control the House with a one-seat majority<\/a>, have candidates on the ballot in 181 districts, the most they\u2019ve had in more than a decade.\u00a0<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n There are also a handful of competitive primaries happening at the congressional level.\u00a0<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a look at some of the races we\u2019re watching.<\/p>\n Pennsylvania\u2019s 1st Congressional District\u00a0<\/p>\n Bucks County Commissioner, and former high school teacher, Bob Harvie is running against Lucia Simonelli, a climate change and energy expert<\/a> who has worked under US Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island). They are looking to challenge US House Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick this fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n Harvie has the backing of Shapiro<\/a>, the Bucks County Democratic Party, and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), while Simonelli is looking to rely on support from progressive voters to get through the primary.\u00a0<\/p>\n Pennsylvania 3rd Congressional District<\/p>\n Three Democrats in Philadelphia are vying for the opportunity to replace outgoing US House Rep. Dwight Evans (D-Pa.) in the country\u2019s most Democratic-leaning seat to have an open primary this election cycle.\u00a0<\/p>\n State Rep. Chris Rabb (D-Philadelphia) has the backing of progressive organizations<\/a> such as Justice Democrats and the Working Families Party and has earned endorsements from national figures like US House Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez<\/a> (D-N.Y.).\u00a0<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n State Sen. Sharif Street (D-Philadelphia) is the former chair of the Pennsylvania Democratic Party and he has the support of Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker<\/a> (D), and various labor unions<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Lastly, Dr. Ala Stanford, who helped with Philadelphia\u2019s response<\/a> to the COVID-19 pandemic, is a first-time congressional candidate who has the support<\/a> of Evans and two other US House Reps. representing Pennsylvania districts, Madeleine Dean and Chrissy Houlahan.<\/p>\n Pennsylvania\u2019s 7th Congressional District<\/p>\n Four Democrats looking to challenge US House Rep. Ryan Mackenzie (R-Lehigh) are running against each other in the Lehigh Valley.\u00a0<\/p>\n Candidates include Bob Brooks, a former firefighter and union leader who has the support of Shapiro and US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Ryan Crosswell, a former corporate lawyer and lawyer at the US Department of Justice, Lamont McClure, former Northampton County executive, and Carol Obando-Derstine<\/a>, who was a staffer under former US Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.).\u00a0<\/p>\n Republicans recently formed a political action committee called the Lean Left PAC<\/a> and are spending more than $1 million<\/a> in the final days of the primary to sway voters against Brooks and Crosswell and support McClure.\u00a0<\/p>\n Pennsylvania\u2019s 10th Congressional District<\/p>\n Dauphin County Commissioner Justin Douglas is running against former WGAL news anchor Janelle Stelson in Tuesday\u2019s primary<\/a>.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n Stelson, who lost to US House Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pennsylvania) by about a percentage point<\/a> in 2024, is poised for a rematch against Perry with the support of Shapiro<\/a> and Democrats from across the country.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With Pennsylvania\u2019s primary election quickly approaching this Tuesday, May 19, voters across the commonwealth have the opportunity to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":192224,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[25041,136,37,33,81372,28,30,29,69,8060],"class_list":["post-192223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-2026-elections","tag-erie","tag-harrisburg","tag-josh-shapiro","tag-pa-labor-report-exclusive","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-philadelphia","tag-stacy-garrity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192223\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/192224"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}