Donald Trump wins Pennsylvania, closing in on a return to the presidency; Republicans sweep Pa. row offices

Pennsylvania elected Republican Dave Sunday, York County’s district attorney, to be its next attorney general.

Sunday, 49, is a career prosecutor who promised to follow the law as written and take a conservative approach to the wide-ranging powers of the attorney general’s office.

He will now be the state’s top prosecutor tasked with investigating corruption, enforcing the state’s laws, and representing the state’s interests nationally in lawsuits against the federal government or major corporations.

Republican Auditor General Timothy DeFoor won his reelection campaign, holding onto the role he was elected to in 2020 and surviving a challenge from one of the Pennsylvania Democratic party’s rising stars.

DeFoor, 62, ran a low-key campaign and made few public appearances in recent months. The Republican was largely outspent by his rival, State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta of North Philadelphia.

In a brisk speech at his election night watch party Tuesday, Kenyatta thanked his supporters and told them to go home before the race was called.

Incumbent Republican State Treasurer Stacy Garrity retained her position, holding off a challenge from Democrat Erin McClelland.

Garrity, 60, was first elected in 2020 after defeating Democratic incumbent Joe Torsella in an upset. She became the first Republican in 16 years to hold the office.

The Pennsylvania state treasurer is the fiscal watchdog for state assets, the custodian of more than $150 billion in commonwealth funds.

Trump called the election results an “historic realignment,” saying that his campaign brought together a wide and diverse coalition that united around a “common core of common sense.”

(The Inquirer, following the Associated Press, did not declare a winner in the election as of yet.)

Trump mentioned the attempt on his life at a Butler, Pennsylvania rally during the summer.

Trump thanked Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and X, for campaigning on his behalf in Pennsylvania.

“We have a new star — Elon!,” Trump said.

Trump expressed his admiration for Musk’s work on SpaceX, launching rockets into space, and Starlink, a satellite internet provider.

Former President Donald Trump thanked his wife, Melania, children, and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R., Ohio).

“I want to be the first to congratulate our great, now I can say, vice president-elect of the United States,” Trump said.

Trump asked Vance to approach the podium and say a few words.

Former President Donald Trump addressed a raucous crowd of supporters just before 2:30 a.m., seconds after the Associated Press declared him the winner of Pennsylvania.

Trump, who was introduced as president-elect, came on stage with his running mate, JD Vance, and family members. The West Palm Beach audience greeted him with “USA! USA!” chants.

The Associated Press, which The Inquirer relies on for election results, had not declared a winner in the presidential race, but Trump appeared to be closing in on victory when he took the stage.

The remaining supporters still hanging out at Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick’s election party in Pittsburgh burst out into cheers once again around 1:45 a.m. when Fox News called the race for Trump in Wisconsin.

AP has not yet called the race in Wisconsin, where Trump is leading Harris by 4.1 percentage points with 89% of votes counted, as of 1:53 a.m.

The supporters were gathered around a TV in a room connected to the main ballroom, where the event was over and workers cleaned up.

Shortly before 1:20 a.m., a small room connected to the main venue at Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick’s Pittsburgh election party erupted in cheers.

Supporters of McCormick and former President Donald Trump embraced one another, waved handheld American flags, and quite literally jumped with joy.

Fox News, a conservative outlet, called the race for Trump in Pennsylvania — the race has not yet been called by AP, which The Philadelphia Inquirer goes by. Trump had a three percentage point lead over Harris in Pennsylvania with 94% of the votes counted, as of 1:41 a.m., according to AP.

U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, a Republican, won his fifth term in Congress Tuesday night after defeating Democrat and Army veteran Ashley Ehasz.

The former FBI agent who has staked his political reputation on being moderate won his rematch against Ehasz to represent Bucks County.

Fitzpatrick, 50, ran a quiet campaign, avoiding the media and questions about whether he supports former President Donald Trump.

Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick took the stage at his Pittsburgh watch party at 12:53 a.m. after being introduced by his wife Dina Powell McCormick, who wore a bright red dress, matching the red carpet on stage.

After embracing he embraced his wife on stage, the crowd chanted “Dave! Dave! Dave!”

“Who’s ready to save America?” he asked the crowd, which was met with cheers.

Philadelphia poll workers are still counting hundreds of thousands of ballots into the early hours of Wednesday morning.

City election officials said during a news conference that there were a little over 202,000 mail-in ballots cast in total; around 37,000 mail-in ballots were still being counted as of midnight, though some will likely have errors and will not immediately count.

Meanwhile, there were 437,427 in-person votes counted in Philadelphia, and that number will continue to grow in the coming hours as poll workers continue to process ballots cast on Tuesday.

Former President Donald Trump led key battleground states as midnight brought Election Day to a close.

The Republican nominee is ahead of Vice President Kamala Harris in the so-called “blue wall” of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. The Democrat is also trailing in Georgia and Arizona, which President Joe Biden narrowly won in 2020.

These leads can change throughout the night, and even upcoming days, as votes more votes are tabulated. And while there are are still millions of ballots to count, Trump and the Republicans are showing signs of strength nationwide.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio fended off a challenge by State Rep. Rob Mercuri to win another term in Western Pennsylvania’s 17th District.

Deluzio, 40, is an Iraq war veteran and voting rights attorney who entered the political arena in 2022, winning the seat by a 7-point margin.

The Democrat highlighted his support for union labor and reproductive rights in his bid for reelection, and cast himself as a defender of democracy.

Excitement only increased as the night went on at Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick’s party in Pittsburgh.

Shortly after 11:30 p.m., Allegheny Republican committee chair Sam DeMarco delivered brief yet optimistic remarks.

“We’re very encouraged by what we’re seeing across the state here,” he said. “Dave is up by about a hundred thousand votes.”

At about 11:29 pm, Jim Worthington, the host of GOP election watch party at the Newtown Athletic Club, took to the podium.

"I think for the first time since 1988, we're going to win Bucks County," Worthington said as the crowd cheered and applauded.

Pasquale O'Neill, 36, an antiques dealer from Fairless Hills was one of the supporters in the crowd.

Former President Donald Trump has improved on his 2020 vote share in 35 of the 36 counties with 95% or more of the vote counted as of 11 p.m. (Pennsylvania’s other 31 counties had far fewer results tabulated.)

In all but one of those counties (Cumberland), Trump has a higher share of the vote than he did four years ago. He also already has a slightly higher number of total votes — about 18,000 more than he did in 2020 with more votes still to be counted.

Vote counting has been slower in Philadelphia and its suburban counties, which are key to Harris’ strategy for Pennsylvania. Only 68% of the vote has been counted in Philadelphia. In the suburbs, 52% has been counted in Bucks County, 48% in Chester County, 68% in Delaware County, and 59% in Montgomery County.

At U.S. Sen. Bob Casey’s election watch party, Scranton Mayor Paige Cognetti addressed the crowd to say the race won’t be called tonight.

“We are confident that when all the votes are counted, Sen. Casey is going to be back in D.C.” Cognetti said to the crowd at about 11:40 p.m. “This could take a couple days.”

The crowd had already dwindled considerably.

Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman apparently canceled his scheduled appearance on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show with 30 seconds to spare.

At least that's what the show's host said live on air tonight.

"He was unable to join us,” Stewart said following the show’s first commercial break. “But because we are a professional and venerated news show it’s not like I just have to sit here … with nobody to talk to or nothing to do just because somebody said 30 seconds before we were supposed to have him as a guest.”

Supporters of U.S. Sen. Bob Casey have begun to leave his watch party in Scranton, and few are optimistic about the three-term Democrats’ chances of fending off a challenge from Republican Dave McCormick.

“I want to be optimistic, but I’m realistic,” Curtis Gray, 51, said as he was leaving the party before a 40-minute drive home to Stroudsburg, Pa.

“As the night progressed, we just started getting sadder and sadder,” said his wife, Eunice Gray, 52. “It feels like 2016 all over again as opposed to 2020.”

Some Burlington County voters were reporting they were still waiting to vote after 11 p.m. Tuesday, two hours after the state’s attorney general extended voting hours to accommodate long lines.

Voters in Burlington Township, Cinnaminson, Moorestown, Florence, and elsewhere said they faced long lines throughout the day because of too few voting booths and problems with new machines.

County officials attributed the long lines to what appeared to be record turnout.

Hundreds of people attended the Pennsylvania Democrats watch party at the Ruba Club in Northern Liberties late Tuesday night, one of the only Democratic Party watch parties in the city.

Huddled into the century-old dimly-lit cabaret bar and non-profit social club were Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle L. Parker, District Attorney Larry Krasner, State Sen. Sharif Street, and dozens of supporters, many of whom were union members or representatives from as far as Denmark and Germany.

Between drinks and laughter, the crowd gazed up at the live election results projected onto the club’s wall. The jovial mood lessened, with some describing it as “nautiously optimistic”, as the night went on and national election results pouring in weren’t in the Democratic party’s favor.

By around 10 p.m. Tuesday election officials in the Philadelphia area were predicting they would finish counting votes by Wednesday evening at the latest even as they have hundreds of thousands more ballots to tally.

Under state law most counties in the state will continue counting ballots overnight, not stopping the counting process until all votes have been counted (aside from provisional ballots and others that are voted on by county election boards days later).

Philadelphia, Bucks, Delaware, and Montgomery and Chester Counties each announced an early round of mail votes Tuesday evening but will continue counting and reporting mail ballots as they report in-person votes throughout the night.

At the election party in Pittsburgh for Republican Senate candidate Dave McCormick, Gloria Hutcherson, of the Tennessee Federation of Republican Women, said she’s been knocking doors with her husband in Pennsylvania for two weeks – first in Harrisburg, and then in Pittsburgh, through a group called the Mighty American Strike Force. The group sent volunteers to battleground states to campaign for Republicans up and down the ballot – the Hutchersons were campaigning in Georgia before coming to Pa., and were also in the Commonwealth back in September.

Hutcherson, 73, a retired banker originally from the Philippines, said she likes Dave McCormick because he embodies conservative values and his policies align with former President Donald Trump, like excluding transgender athletes from women’s sports and closing the border.

“He is a businessman, like Donald Trump,” she said. “ … Donald Trump needs Dave McCormick, so that's why we're supporting him.”

State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta thanked his Auditor General race supporters in a brisk campaign speech at around 10:30 p.m. as he trailed incumbent Auditor General Tim DeFoor by about 5 percentage points, according to the state run election results posted online.

“We recognize that there's still a lot of votes to be counted, and we want to make sure that every single vote is counted,” Kenyatta said in his remarks, which lasted about two minutes. “And we're in a position where, A, we feel a lot of gratitude, B, we feel a lot of confidence that when the votes are counted, we're going to get a result that we like, and that C, we don't want to leave you here all night as we wait for those votes to be counted.”

Kenyatta’s political director Michelle McFall said the candidate is in a good space, but that waiting for all votes to be counted in a race that’s too close to call is “a challenge.

Former President Donald Trump is showing signs of matching or improving his strength in several Pennsylvania counties.

Unofficial data from the Associated Press showed Trump appeared to have bested his 2020 vote totals in Clinton, Lackawanna, Lawrence, Indiana, Northumberland, Elk, Sullivan, Wyoming, Jefferson, Fulton, Clarion, Potter, Forest and Lycoming. Each of the counties had at least 95% of the expected vote reported.

While Trump is not necessarily winning in these counties, or Pennsylvania, it shows he is outperforming his 2020 effort.

Car after car lined up outside the Bucks County Administration building at 10 p.m. Tuesday, delivering the raw materials of democracy—the completed ballots from precincts throughout the county.

There was no rush, bustle, or rancor. The ballots were rolled like shopping carts on the sidewalk—the will of the people, stacked and loaded and ready to be stored.

Inside the building, the memory sticks and tapes from

Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt recalled his own experience with threats following the 2020 election while discussing bomb threats that impacted several counties across the commonwealth in a press conference Tuesday night.

“I’ve had experience with threats of violence and they’re not always credible. You do have to take them seriously. Threats are intended to intimidate and coerce,” he said.

At this time, Schmidt said, officials do not know the source of the threats but can confirm that they posed “no credible threat to the public.”

The polls are now closed in all seven presidential swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

Still, that doesn't mean to expect results quite yet. Arizona and Pennsylvania election officials anticipate counting to go on for days.

None of the battleground states have been called yet, but Donald Trump leads Georgia with 87% of turnout tabulated so far. Eighty-four percent of North Carolina's votes are tabulated right now, but the race is still too close to call.

It will likely be around midnight before the next batch of Philadelphia's mail votes are publicly available, city commissioners say.

Already there are more than 219,000 ballots posted to the city's official results tracker; 115,161 votes were cast by mail, and 104,380 cast at polling places.

Tracking with the city's deep blue voter registration, a lion's share went to Democrats.

Spirits were high at the Grand Ballroom at the Fairmount Pittsburgh for Dave McCormick’s election night party. A live band played “Footloose” as an inaudible Fox News played on a big projector behind them. Another screen on the side of the room played CNN silently, largely ignored by attendees, especially compared to another TV screen playing Fox News in a bar area. But largely, people just mingled with drinks as the music filled the room.

That changed at roughly 9:50 p.m., when the music suspended and the sound of the Fox News filled the room briefly, albeit with connection issues, before returning to music. The Fox News TVs were on full blast at nearly 10:10 p.m., and the room cheered as Pennsylvania showed Trump with a 1.5 percentage point lead — albeit with just 47% of votes in and the screen saying “too soon to call.”

Mary Dodgi, 80, a retired teacher who lives in Ross Township in the North Hills of Pittsburgh, said at the party that McCormick “has a great background in business” — similar praise she had for former President Donald Trump.

Rep. Jeff Van Drew, a Republican from deep South Jersey’s 2nd Congressional District known for pledging “undying support” to Donald Trump, was elected to a fourth term.

Van Drew, 71, a dentist, defeated Democrat Joe Salerno, 62, an engineer and software developer who is a recent transplant to Cape May County.

Van Drew was first elected to Congress in 2018 as a Democrat, but switched parties in 2019 after receiving pressure to vote to impeach then-President Trump.

Delaware State Sen. Sarah McBride made history Tuesday night, winning the race for Delaware’s only Congressional district. She will be the first openly transgender member of Congress and is already the nation’s highest-ranking openly transgender elected official.

McBride, 33, defeated Republican John Whalen III, a former police officer and construction company owner.

McBride said earlier this year that diversity in Congress is important, but she didn’t run on her identity. Instead, by proving to be an effective legislator, she hopes to inspire acceptance through what she called the “power of proximity.”

At around 6:50 p.m. Tuesday, the collective email for Chester County's voter services operations received a bomb threat targeted at the Government Services Center, where voter services, the county's 911 operations, and two voting precincts are located.

Everyone in the building was quickly evacuated, officials said, including voters and elections workers who receive in-person ballots from the county's polling places. Chester County's mail-in ballots are counted elsewhere.

Explosive detection dogs searched the building and no bombs were found, said Sheriff Kevin Dykes. Staff were allowed back in the building about an hour to an hour and a half after the original threat, he said.

Scranton Mayor Paige Cognetti said she saw “positive energy” for Democrats in the key battleground of Lackawanna County on Tuesday.

“My own precinct had lines that I have never seen before,” said Cognetti, who lives on the west side of Scranton. “Lots of new voters were there. It took a little while because people were voting for the first time and that’s an exciting development that I think bodes well here in Scranton for Sen. Casey, for Congressman Cartwright, for Kamala Harris as we go into this night of waiting.”

Scranton, the seat of Lackawanna County, is the hometown of President Joe Biden and U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, who faces a well-financed reelection challenge this year from Republican Dave McCormick. It has become an increasingly important region as both parties fight for blue-collar voters in post-industrial cities.

At several South Philadelphia polling places, Democratic committee people and poll watchers found themselves without Republican counterparts–to the dismay of GOP voters.

At Whitman library, on Snyder Avenue, Democrat Catherine Enck said she was surprised by the lack of signs for Donald Trump or Senate candidate Dave McCormick.

“In 2020 there were people from the Republican Party who were there handing you sample ballots,” said Enck, who was there from 8:00 in the morning until 6:30 at night. “I was shocked and there were no Trump signs out and no official Republican presence there at all.”

A Pennsylvania spokesperson for the Trump campaign suggested in a post on X Tuesday that Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker was “illegally campaigning in a polling location” by taking a photo with three individuals at the venue.

"Will Philly DA Larry Krasner apply his “F around and find out” pledge to Mayor Parker??” wrote Kush Desai, the Team Trump Pa. spokesperson, on X. It does not immediately appear that other members of the Trump campaign have circulated the claim.

Desai did not provide evidence the mayor was campaigning inside a polling place, only that she was inside one.

Montgomery County officials said Tuesday about 8:30 p.m., after polls had closed, that preliminary results showed Vice President Kamala Harris had received 71,072 votes mostly from mail-in ballots, while former President Donald Trump had received 21,931 votes.

That represented about 14% of the county’s 632,813 registered voters.

Neil Makhija, chair of the county commission, said in-person ballots should be tabulated by midnight or by the early morning hours, but that unofficial results won’t be available until tomorrow.

State Sen. Sharif Street was full of confidence about the Democratic effort to get the party’s candidates elected when he stopped by State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta’s Auditor General election night party. 

“Malcolm’s going to win,” he said plainly. 

Kenyatta is running against incumbent Auditor General Tim DeFoor, a Republican who’s held the position for one term. 

Around 8:45 p.m. Tuesday, already counted ballots from throughout the county were being brought to the Bucks County administration building.

Illuminated by spotlights and wheeled into the brick and glass structure under a blue and white tent, the ballots were treated like precious cargo.

“Is this where we drop off the ballots?” a woman yelled from a van.

Shortly after 8 p.m. Tuesday night Philadelphia-area counties began reporting the results of mail ballots they’d been processing since 7 a.m.

Those returns leaned heavily towards Vice President Kamala Harris. But returns at this stage should be taken with a grain of salt. They are exclusively mail votes, which are more likely to be cast by Democrats. Returns are likely to shift towards Republicans as in-person results come in later in the evening but continued reports of mail ballots that came in on Election Day or later will again shift results towards Democrats.

There were 115,161 votes processed in Philadelphia as of 8:15 p.m. All of those votes were cast by mail. The number represented the majority of ballots cast by mail that the county had received by Tuesday at 7 p.m. According to state data, Philadelphia had received about 185,000 ballots.

Supporters of U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr. (D., Pa.) who have gathered for his campaign’s election results watch party at the Scranton Cultural Center burst into applause Thursday evening when early returns flashed on a screen showing the three-term incumbent up big.

But it’s still far too early to know which way Pennsylvania's nationally watched Senate race is headed.

The contest between Casey and Republican Dave McCormick saw more than $300 million in spending by the campaigns and outside spending groups. Casey led in the polls throughout the race, but his lead shrank towards the end of the campaign.

A series of bomb threats were sent to polling places in key counties across Pennsylvania on Tuesday night, less than two hours before polls closed.

The threats, which appear to have been hoaxes sent via email, sowed confusion and led to a range of disruptive actions — including evacuation — and requests to extend voting hours past 8 p.m. Locations in Bucks, Centre, Chester, Delaware and Philadelphia Counties were the subject of threats, as well as several counties outside the metro region.

The incidents also follow bomb threats that targeted several polling places in Georgia earlier on Election Day. The FBI said that it was aware of unfounded threats targeting several states, many of which “appear to originate from Russian email domains.”

A handful of bomb threats, and an allegation of a person using a hidden camera to film election workers, were minor blips in what was otherwise peaceful Election Day in Philadelphia, District Attorney Larry Krasner said in a news conference as polls closed Tuesday evening.

One person was detained at a polling place near 66th Street and Chester Avenue after making such threats in person, Krasner said -- but there was no indication that the person had a plan or ability to carry our the threats.

That and other written threats, he said, were phony: "No bombs. No one hurt. No boom."

Chester County Commissioner Josh Maxwell said that the county government center had received a bomb threat via email that was also sent to several other jurisdictions. The building had been evacuated.

Bomb-sniffing dogs are currently searching the building, he said, to determine whether a bomb was actually planted in the building.

He said he could not comment on whether ballots being counted at the facility had been moved. In a tweet, he said that the facility is where in-person ballots are delivered, while mail-in ballots are tabulated elsewhere.

Shortly after 8 p.m. Tuesday, Philadelphia-area counties began reporting the results of mail ballots they’d been processing since 7 a.m.

Those returns leaned heavily toward Vice President Kamala Harris. But returns at this stage should be taken with a grain of salt. They are exclusively mail votes, which are more likely to be cast by Democrats. Returns are likely to shift toward Republicans as in-person results come in later in the evening but continued reports of mail ballots that came in on Election Day or later will again shift results towards Democrats.

There were 115,161 votes processed in Philadelphia as of 8:15 p.m. All of those votes were cast by mail. The number represented the majority of ballots cast by mail that the county had received by Tuesday at 7 p.m.. According to state data, Philadelphia had received about 185,000 ballots.

Andy Kim, the millennial son of South Korean immigrants and three-term Democratic congressman, was elected to the U.S. Senate in a historic win that upended New Jersey politics and gives Kim the distinction of being the country’s first Korean American senator.

Kim, 42, who was raised in Marlton and now lives in Moorestown, takes the seat held for 18 years by former Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez, who resigned after being convicted of federal bribery and corruption charges.

Since leaping into the race the day after Menendez was indicted on corruption charges, Kim promised voters he would represent a new kind of New Jersey politician, both generationally and morally.