On Tuesday, Nov. 4, residents across Pennsylvania cast their votes in various state and local races, including Pennsylvania\u2019s judicial elections and Pittsburgh\u2019s mayoral race.<\/p>\n
Tuesday\u2019s Election Day marked the first major election<\/a> since President Trump\u2019s 2024 re-election. Major races outside Pennsylvania included New York City\u2019s mayoral race<\/a>, California\u2019s Proposition 50<\/a> and gubernatorial races in New Jersey<\/a> and Virginia<\/a>. At 9:53 p.m. on Tuesday, AP News announced that all three PA Supreme Court Justices were retained<\/a>. In Pittsburgh, the mayoral race was called<\/a> at 8:26 p.m., announcing Democrat Corey O\u2019Connor\u2019s win over Republican nominee Tony Moreno.\u00a0<\/p>\n Oakland voters cast their ballots in the William Pitt Union, Bellefield Hall, Posvar Hall and Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall and Museum on Tuesday from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Many of the voters on Pitt\u2019s campus were college students who found this election particularly important.<\/p>\n Thomas Simione, a sophomore media and professional communications major, acknowledged that the opportunity to vote and have a say in who governs the state he lives in doesn\u2019t come every day.<\/p>\n \u201cI voted because I want to engage politically with my community,\u201d Thomas said. \u201cI\u2019m going to be living here, so I want to have a say in who is controlling my community, who\u2019s in charge.\u201d<\/p>\n Alyssa Hipsky, a first-year computational biology major, values the impact that young voices have in smaller, local elections.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s very important to be involved, especially in the current political climate<\/a>,\u201d Hipsky said. \u201cI ended up voting for mostly the Democratic Party because I agreed with all of their reasonings.\u201d<\/p>\n Ray Salac, a sophomore urban planning major, emphasized the importance for students in particular to show up to the polls.<\/p>\n \u201cWe make up a big population<\/a> in Pittsburgh, so I think we should have our voices here just as much as everyone else,\u201d Salac said.<\/p>\n Judy Cameron, a professor of psychiatry at Pitt, went to the WPU to cast her vote along with many students.<\/p>\n \u201cI am really pleased today to see so many students,\u201d Cameron said. \u201cI come here every year, and frequently, there aren\u2019t a lot of students voting.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Dan Frankel<\/a>, a Democratic member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, has been representing the 23rd district<\/a> for 27 years and spent his day at Pitt\u2019s polling locations, chatting with voters.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s great to see people exercising their franchise to vote \u2014 something that is fundamental to maintaining our democracy \u2014 particularly in an era where we are clearly fraught with challenges<\/a> to maintaining it,\u201d Frankel said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n According to Frankel, who has been coming to University voting locations since his election almost 30 years ago, noticed a significant increase<\/a> in voters this year. He suggested that young voters are \u201cpicking up an interest\u201d in understanding the importance of non-presidential elections.<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI think kids \u2014 young people \u2014\u00a0get motivated when they find that the things past generations may have taken for granted, can\u2019t be taken for granted anymore,\u201d Frankel said.<\/p>\n Brielle Anderson, a junior psychology major, said she voted because she wanted to \u201csee change\u201d that benefits herself and those around her.<\/p>\n \u201cThere were some of my friends today who didn\u2019t register [to vote] in time, and I was like, \u2018Guys, come on,\u2019\u201d Anderson said. \u201cI feel like this is the one opportunity where you can put your voice out there, especially in today\u2019s political climate.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Outside the WPU, College Democrats at Pitt<\/a> were greeting voters while handing out informational sheets and slate cards of Democratic candidates endorsed<\/a> by the Allegheny County Democratic Committee<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Tommy Berenson, a senior urban planning major and member of Pitt College Democrats, said voting \u201cyes\u201d to retain<\/a> the three Democratic Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justices was very important to this election and to supporting national democratic goals.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThey are helping to preserve fair election maps<\/a> in Pennsylvania, they\u2019re helping to preserve a woman\u2019s right to choose<\/a>, they\u2019re doing things that students here at the University of Pittsburgh should value as their rights,\u201d Berenson said.<\/p>\n Alexander Briese, a junior mechanical engineering major, said he decided to vote after seeing advertisements and articles about the Pennsylvania judicial election online.<\/p>\n \u201cI did a bit of independent research and learned [about] the different candidates,\u201d Briese said. \u201cFrom what I understand, the risk with not retaining the judges is that we [would] get people who are a lot more brash and will make decisions that don\u2019t benefit the greater good.\u201d<\/p>\n Jesse Milston, vice president of College Republicans at Pitt<\/a> and junior political science major, hoped Pennsylvania would vote not to retain the PA Supreme Court Justices.<\/p>\n \u201cEvery election is important regardless of what is on the ballot,\u201d Milston said. \u201cFor the College Republicans, [this election] means the opportunity to vote \u2018no\u2019 on radical judges like Dougherty, Donohue and Wecht.\u201d<\/p>\n Norah Stotz, a sophomore neuroscience and economics student, said she voted for Democratic candidates because they align with her views on \u201cimportant issues.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201c[Democratic candidates] are the people supporting my rights and the rights of my close friends,\u201d Stotz said. \u201cI want to keep the rights that everyone currently has without being in danger of losing the right to get married<\/a> or have life-saving care<\/a> and abortion access<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Sage Lee, a first-year linguistics major, came to vote in her first election because she wanted to share her voice and \u201chelp\u201d in the retention of PA\u2019s Supreme Court Justices.<\/p>\n \u201cSeeing all the news in the past few years and not being able to vote \u2014 especially with the last presidential election \u2014 I was extremely frustrated that I couldn\u2019t do anything about it,\u201d Lee said.<\/p>\n For Jacob Weiser, a sophomore bioengineering major, this year marked his second election voting.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cEven though this election isn\u2019t as big as last year\u2019s [presidential election], it\u2019s still important to ensure that your voice is heard on the local level,\u201d Weiser said. \u201cMy political opinions matter on all levels of government, and so I need to make sure that it\u2019s represented on all of those levels.\u201d<\/p>\n Olivia Hart, a junior majoring in law, criminal justice and society, has voted on-campus all three years that she has been at Pitt, even though she\u2019s originally from Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n \u201cMy parents advised me to switch my voting registration to PA [be]cause I\u2019m from D.C., so PA needs my vote<\/a> a lot more than D.C. does,\u201d Hart said.<\/p>\n Hart said she believes it is her \u201ccivic duty\u201d to vote in every election.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are a lot of people who can\u2019t vote. There are a lot of countries in which they don\u2019t have this,\u201d Hart said. \u201cI think it\u2019s really important to exercise [the right to vote] as soon as you are able to because every vote counts at the end of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n