How the Pa. Republican establishment broke itself trying to stop Doug Mastriano

On a rainy Friday earlier this month, several leading Republican candidates for governor headed to Westmoreland County in western Pennsylvania for former President Donald Trump’s rally that evening.

With less than two weeks before the primary election, State Sen. Doug Mastriano was leading in the polls, and some of the candidates and their aides were holding out hope Trump would use the rally to endorse a rival who could topple the front-runner.

Their hope was dashed. Trump spent his time touting his Senate pick, Mehmet Oz.

It was another lost opportunity for those who saw a Mastriano candidacy as a disaster for the Republican Party in Pennsylvania in the general election.

As the election drew even closer, some of the most influential players in Pennsylvania Republican politics hatched what they hoped was another scenario to take down Mastriano.

Andy Reilly, a Republican National Committee member, sent an email to associates of the leading candidate, with a proposal for an independent poll that would help the party fairly identify a single alternative to Mastriano.

“As of now we are looking at this being advisory,” Reilly wrote. “However, I believe it would be best to commit to go with the candidate who is closest to M [Mastriano] and rally behind him or her.”

In the days that followed, key players failed to get on the same page. The state party chair, Lawrence Tabas, declined to give his blessing. A major Republican donor called one of the candidates, former U.S. Attorney Bill McSwain, asking him to withdraw from the race.

And even as party insiders started to coalesce behind former U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta – who was second in the poll – a proposal to infuse his campaign with more cash never materialized.

By the end of the week, the head of a political action committee that spent $13 million backing McSwain told the former prosecutor and another candidate for governor that he would be issuing a statement calling on both of them to drop out and endorse Barletta.

Trump had endorsed Mastriano by that point, and the effort to coalesce behind someone else was too little, too late. But the hectic final days, described to The Inquirer by more than a half-dozen Republican sources familiar with the effort, underscored the continued erosion of state political machines at a time of renewed populism in Pennsylvania and across the country.

And the results of the election – Mastriano won with about 44% of the vote, far outperforming GOP expectations – shows just how out of step the party insiders are with Republican voters, a sign that the party is still grappling with Trump’s impact on Republican politics.

As the GOP turns its focus toward the general election against Democratic nominee Josh Shapiro, Republicans are also trying to assess what went wrong over the last several months. While party chair Tabas has been reluctant about imposing edicts from above, many now are pointing the finger at him, saying he failed to provide leadership.

A prominent Republican active in Pennsylvania politics, who requested anonymity to speak freely about party conversations, predicted that some prominent GOP members will publicly support Shapiro over Mastriano. And after November’s general election, Tabas may see a call for a new party chair.

“The general consensus is he failed to lead and left this thing to fester,” the Republican said.

“It’s an act of political malpractice that the Republican State Committee didn’t do much to shape or condition the field months ago,” said former GOP U.S. Rep Charlie Dent, adding that his criticism wasn’t aimed at Tabas specifically. “Everyone was worried Mastriano could prevail in a crowded, multi-candidate field.”

» READ MORE: Pennsylvania Republicans tried to stop Doug Mastriano. But first they followed him.

Vonne Andring, senior adviser to the state GOP, defended the party’s decision. “With record Republican turnout, and with 44% of the vote going to Mastriano — despite the millions spent against him — it should be obvious that there is a much stronger appeal for his candidacy than many predicted,” she said in a statement. “Political malpractice would be to signal to our voters that we’re not with them — or to delay turning our efforts to defeating Josh Shapiro and the extreme Democrat agenda in November.”

The Republican insiders who opposed Mastriano did so on the grounds that polling suggested he would struggle in a general election. Some say his presence in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021, his peddling of conspiracy theories, and his penchant for controversy — like attending a conference last month that promoted QAnon — will make it harder for Republicans to focus the fall campaign on issues like inflation. The latest example came Friday, when the Washington Post published an article about a master’s thesis Mastriano wrote 20 years ago in which he warned of a potential “Hitlerian putsch” in the U.S.

But at least one prominent Pennsylvania Republican appears happy with the party.

“The last time we had an election like this was in 1978, when the party had the courage to let the people decide,” Mastriano said during his victory speech Tuesday night, referring to how the state party declined to endorse a candidate for governor. “So you know, hats off to the state party first off for not putting the finger on the scale.”

The state party Isn’t the only organization whose endorsement was coveted.

Commonwealth Partners Chamber of Entrepreneurs, a membership association that promotes free markets and charter schools, had $20 million sitting in its political action committee’s bank account. Its generous political action committee has been largely bankrolled by Jeffrey Yass, the cofounder of a trading firm who is the wealthiest man in Pennsylvania.

The group, led by CEO Matt Brouillette, has become a powerhouse in Pennsylvania politics in recent years. Brouillette has been credited with helping Republicans win elections for state Supreme Court, Commonwealth Court, and auditor general. The governor’s race was its biggest opportunity yet to play kingmaker.

Allies of McSwain believed as early as September that the group would be endorsing him. It was “very, very much implied,” according to a source close to McSwain.

But no firm commitment was made. McSwain wasn’t clearing the field, and Commonwealth ended up vetting most of the candidates. The candidates made their cases in one-on-one interviews with Brouillette, as well as conversations with Commonwealth’s board.

In the intervening months, the field grew bigger, with Dave White, a former Delaware County councilman and wealthy HVAC contractor, and state Senate leader Jake Corman getting into the race. Corman’s candidacy came as a surprise to White, as the two had met over the summer at a steamfitters union hall in Philadelphia to discuss White’s expected bid.

Mastriano announced his long-anticipated campaign in January.

Commonwealth Partners ultimately endorsed McSwain in January. Though he was a first-time candidate for public office, Commonwealth thought he would make the strongest governor and work well with the legislature.

It’s impossible to know for sure, but arguably the late endorsement may have hurt McSwain by giving oxygen to other candidates, including some with substantial financial resources.

The state party held its winter meeting in February and voted not to endorse, leaving intact a sprawling field. A couple would drop out, but nine still ended up on the primary ballot.

As Commonwealth’s PAC spent millions on the airwaves, McSwain was climbing the polls. A Trafalgar Group survey taken April 11-13 showed Mastriano with 21.9% of the vote, Barletta with 18.8%, and McSwain with 17.4%. And McSwain had a lot more money to spend.

Just as the poll was being conducted, the campaign took a turn with a “Mar-a-Lago missile,” as one source put it – an April 12 statement from Trump blasting McSwain for not prosecuting voter fraud in Philadelphia in the 2020 election.

It seemed like a potential death knell to McSwain’s candidacy. But that didn’t necessarily show up in the polls, as he remained competitive with Barletta and White.

Commonwealth Partners took aim at Mastriano, sending mailers to GOP primary voters attacking Mastriano’s statements from March 2020 in which the senator called on the federal government to roll back federal privacy protections for COVID-19 patients. It seemed like a potentially potent attack on a candidate who had centered his campaign around personal freedom and opposition to government mandates.

Extra help to bring down Mastriano came from a newly formed political group registered in Ohio called Pennsylvania Patriots for Election Integrity. The group, which does not appear to have disclosed its donors, spent more than $1 million on anti-Mastriano TV ads.

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But the attacks didn’t affect Mastriano’s standing in the polls. And Mastriano got a boost from an unlikely source – Democrats. Shapiro’s campaign in early May started airing TV ads linking him to Trump – apparently believing Mastriano was the weakest Republican candidate. The state Democratic Party sent mailers to GOP primary voters with a similar message.

By that point, establishment Republicans hoped Trump would help save the day by endorsing someone other than Mastriano at his May 6 rally in Western Pennsylvania. Instead, Trump focused on promoting his pick in the U.S. Senate race – Oz – and attacking Oz rival David McCormick.

As much as Commonwealth boosted McSwain, trust issues developed throughout his campaign. McSwain’s allies say two top campaign advisers – admaker Larry Weitzner, a Trump campaign veteran, and pollster Jon Lerner, a longtime adviser to former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley – were effectively sidelined. Sources close to McSwain said Commonwealth tapped their own personnel instead.

Then GOP insiders went into panic mode.

Reilly sent the May 6 email outlining language to be used for an independent poll. But the idea faced almost immediate resistance. That weekend, GOP officials spoke by phone to discuss the race. In one call, Tabas, the state party chairman, reiterated his opposition to intervening in the race.

On Monday, May 9, The Inquirer and other news outlets reported on the poll and the 11th-hour effort to stop Mastriano. The results of the poll – paid for by a PAC Reilly helps run – came back the next day. It showed Mastriano with 17% of the vote, followed by Barletta, McSwain, and White. Barletta led McSwain, but they were separated by just tenths of a percentage point.

Now that Mastriano has captured the nomination, it appears that no one wants to be much associated with that last-minute poll.

In a statement, Reilly said he was a neutral party who was asked by the remaining non-Mastriano candidates to coordinate a poll that “was suggested.” “The poll was approved by the campaigns, put into the field, and the results shared with the campaigns,” he said.

People close to the campaigns disputed this characterization, saying Reilly was the one spearheading the poll.

On May 10, GOP insiders stepped up their pressure campaign to narrow the field. Yass called McSwain and encouraged him to get out of the race. McSwain said he would think about it.

The call was first reported by the New York Times.

The very next day, Brouillette, Commonwealth’s president, contacted McSwain’s campaign with advice on how it should spend his last remaining $1 million, according to two people familiar with the matter. Commonwealth had contributed $4.5 million directly to McSwain’s campaign in April, records show. The message – almost immediately after Commonwealth’s biggest donor urged McSwain to get out – had a whipsaw effect on McSwain’s team. It seemed like Commonwealth might be sticking with him after all.

In another twist, Barletta’s team, buoyed by the poll, at that same time had opened up a line of communication to Commonwealth — and even thought that the organization was now willing to provide an infusion of campaign cash, according to someone close to Barletta. Although there were just a few days left in the race, Barletta’s team thought it could spend the cash on digital ads and get-out-the-vote operations like paying a firm to conduct live phone calls to primary voters.

Another person familiar with the talks said that expectation was misplaced.

By now, money issues were swirling.

On Friday, McSwain’s campaign transferred $500,000 to Commonwealth’s PAC, at Commonwealth’s request.

The reason behind the request is in dispute. One source said Commonwealth said the money was due to rebates from television advertising. Another said the media market was saturated and there was no more airtime available.

McSwain wasn’t the only candidate facing pressure to withdraw. White’s team heard from multiple Republicans. At one point, one interlocutor told White’s team he might be considered for secretary of labor in a future Barletta administration, according to a source with knowledge of the matter. The source said the idea was not presented as an explicit inducement to drop out.

The following morning, Saturday, Trump endorsed Mastriano. Most Republican insiders thought that would seal the deal for Mastriano.

The next day brought another surprise.

On Sunday evening – two days before the election – Brouillette sent a group text message to McSwain and White, informing them he would be issuing a statement endorsing Barletta and encouraging them to do the same.

The statement went out a few minutes later. “At the end of the day, Commonwealth Partners is about a cause, not about a particular candidate,” the statement said. “That’s why today, we are endorsing Lou Barletta for governor, and it’s why we will continue our call for Bill McSwain and Dave White to withdraw from the race and do the same for the good of our commonwealth and our country.”

McSwain did not respond to the text. White is said to have given a colorful response.

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Later that evening, Brouillette connected with Barletta’s team to discuss the endorsement — and that potential last-minute campaign contribution. According to a source close to Barletta, Brouillette told Barletta’s team that McSwain was “trying to keep all of our money and prevent moving it” to Barletta.

A source close to McSwain said Brouillette never asked for more than the $500,000 it already transferred.

As for Barletta, the money never came.

Brouillette said his group would have invested more money if Barletta had been successful in persuading McSwain and White to withdraw.

“The cake was already baked,” Brouillette told The Inquirer. “The money we invested with Bill was a sunk cost at that point, but we were willing to give it one last push if we had a hook to move voters.”