Tomorrow, Tuesday, May 19, is Primary Election Day in Pennsylvania. To vote in the primary, voters must be registered Democrats or Republicans because Pennsylvania\u2019s primary system is used to choose each party\u2019s nominees for the general election.<\/p>\n
Political observers expect turnout may be lower than in recent high-profile elections, largely because many races on both party ballots are uncontested.<\/p>\n
Both Erie County party chairs say they hope voters still show up at the polls, even though most Democratic and Republican candidates are running without primary challengers.<\/p>\n
The lack of contested races has resulted in far less advertising and public attention than voters saw during recent presidential primaries, when campaign visits, political ads, and long lines at polling places dominated the election season.<\/p>\n
Instead, turnout may look more like Pennsylvania\u2019s last gubernatorial primary, when Erie County turnout reached just over 31%.<\/p>\n
Voters will still decide party nominees for governor, lieutenant governor, Pennsylvania\u2019s 16th Congressional District, and several state representative races heading into the fall election.<\/p>\n
With the exception of the Republican lieutenant governor race, most candidates do not face primary opposition.<\/p>\n
While the top races may not be competitive, both parties have multiple candidates running for Erie County and state party committee seats \u2014 positions local leaders say are important because they help determine the future of the parties.<\/p>\n
Cliff Smathers, Erie County GOP chairman said committee members play a major role in shaping party leadership and priorities. \u201cThose are big for us because they decide kind of the future of the party.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sam Talarico, chair of the Erie County Democratic party said state committee members are especially influential because they help determine statewide endorsements. \u201cThe big thing they do is probably state endorsements for statewide candidates \u2014 and that\u2019s really important.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even without many contested races, both party leaders say voting still matters. Talarico said, \u201cWe hope people get out to vote. It is important, although we do realize that for all the elective offices, at least on the Democratic side, there\u2019s no contested primary.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smathers also urged voters of all political affiliations to take part in the election process. \u201cI want every person \u2014 I don\u2019t care the party, I don\u2019t care the affiliation \u2014 to go out and exercise their right all the time. People need to get out and vote. It\u2019s a must.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of the nearly 19,000 mail ballots sent out for the Erie County primary, Director of Elections Tonia Fernandez says more than 14,000 have already been returned.<\/p>\n
Still, with nearly 150,000 registered voters in Erie County \u2014 including 76,605 Democrats and 71,049 Republicans \u2014 most voters will need to cast ballots in person for turnout to rise significantly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tomorrow, Tuesday, May 19, is Primary Election Day in Pennsylvania. To vote in the primary, voters must be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":196056,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[6375,136,142,138,137,8464,87064,28,5638,5085,8349,87065,7573],"class_list":["post-196055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-erie","tag-democratic-party","tag-erie","tag-erie-county","tag-erie-headlines","tag-erie-news","tag-mail-ballots","tag-party-committee","tag-pennsylvania","tag-primary-election","tag-republican-party","tag-state-representative","tag-uncontested-races","tag-voter-turnout"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196055","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=196055"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196055\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}