Dave McCormick confuses Philly with Mississippi city in now-deleted X post
The Republican Senate candidate deleted the post and acknowledged his mistake, but Democrats were quick to pounce on the slip up, including Sen. Bob Casey's campaign.
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Pennsylvania Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick seemed to confuse Philadelphia, Mississippi with Philadelphia, Pennsylvania while commenting on a shooting in a since-deleted post on X Wednesday.
McCormick, who is running against three-term Sen. Bob Casey in November, shared a clip from a Mississippi news station on a shooting that police say was orchestrated by a gang member from El Salvador, using the situation to fuel the campaign’s focus on border security.
“MS-13 gang members are terrorizing Philadelphians because of Harris & Casey’s radical open border policies,” McCormick wrote. The post was deleted within minutes, according to ABC 27.
A McCormick campaign spokesperson directed The Inquirer to a Wednesday evening X post from McCormick, acknowledging the confusion.
“We made a mistake on our tweet, and that’s not nearly as bad as Bob Casey making a mistake leaving the border wide open,” McCormick wrote.
The Casey campaign took advantage of the slip up. “Since David McCormick lives in Connecticut, it’s not surprising he can’t tell the difference between Pennsylvania and Mississippi. We can help, Dave — Pennsylvania is the state that is going to reject you in November,” communications director Maddy McDaniel said in a statement.
McCormick’s original post garnered attention from the senator’s campaign and other Democrats.
“Things like this tend to happen for people who live in Connecticut but run for the Senate in Pennsylvania,” Sen. John Fetterman wrote in a post on X.
McCormick, who lived part-time in Connecticut until his rental ended in June, trails Casey in an August New York Times poll by 14 points and an Emerson College poll by 4, is continuing to fight “carpetbagger” accusations from Democrats. McCormick owns a house in Pittsburgh and grew up in Northeast Pennsylvania.
McCormick has highlighted his Pennsylvania roots in recent speeches in the commonwealth and continues to attack Casey on immigration, which is among the top important issues to Pennsylvanians, according to August polling from The New York Times and Emerson College.
This story has been updated to clarify McCormick’s residential status.