State Rep. Ryan Mackenzie ousts U.S. Rep. Susan Wild in competitive race key in determining who controls the House
The Republican challenger won what was considered a toss-up race that would be critical in determining the balance of Congress.
Republican State Rep. Ryan Mackenzie won Susan Wild’s seat in the Lehigh Valley’s 7th Congressional District, a victory with significant implications for the balance of the House of Representatives.
The win was “extremely exciting,” said Mackenzie’s communications director, Arnaud Armstrong, because Mackenzie had been outspent by Wild “several times over. ... And people had counted us out because of that.”
Armstrong credited a “new coalition” of voters for their part in fueling the victory, including working-class Latinos in Allentown who proved to be “enormously helpful.” That voting bloc “gave voice to the needs and concerns of working families that have been left behind by several generations of Washington politicians,” Armstrong said.
Wild had conceded the race on Wednesday.
“There is no sugarcoating it: this is a bitterly disappointing outcome,” Wild wrote in a statement, posted on X. She congratulated Mackenzie and offered to assist him as he prepares to take office.
“I understand the very real fear that many of those who supported me likely feel, as we wonder what’s next for our community and country. To all of you who worked tirelessly to keep this seat in Democratic hands, know this: I will continue to use my voice to fight for the causes that drove me to run for office in the first place. Women’s rights, workers’ rights, affordable health care, democracy itself, are all issues that require constant engagement, from all of us, to form a better country.”
Mackenzie, a right-wing Republican who represents parts of Lehigh County in Harrisburg and who asked Congress not to certify the 2020 presidential election results, emphasized discontent with inflation and problems at the U.S.-Mexico border during his campaign.
The race, which had been considered a toss-up, was called “absolutely one of the most important in the country,” said Stephen Medvic, director of the Center for Politics and Public Affairs at Franklin & Marshall College.
Some voters waited hours to vote in the district. At Lehigh University, which is in the 7th Congressional District about 60 miles north of Philadelphia, some students reported waiting in line for upwards of three hours at the Banana Factory Arts Center near campus — far longer than voters at other polling places in the state. Video shared with The Inquirer showed lines wrapping around the building and down the block.
Fifteen minutes after polls closed on Election Night, students remained in line to vote, said Tracey King, a spokeswoman for the university.
Mackenzie, 42, traces his lineage in the region back nine generations to when his ancestors joined the Northampton County Militia to fight in the Revolutionary War. He was elected to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 2012, and he lives in Lower Macungie Township in Lehigh County.
Mackenzie, who has an MBA from Harvard Business School, emphasized wasteful government spending as a prime issue, along with “crippling” inflation and border security. He portrayed himself as “bipartisan and mainstream,” having reached across the aisle on efforts to support first responders and improve health care, according to Arnaud Armstrong, communications director for Mackenzie’s campaign.
Out on the stump, Mackenzie “makes Wild out to be a leftist radical” for supporting the Biden agenda, though she’s a proven centrist, said political scientist Chris Borick, director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion. Besides, he added, “in the Lehigh Valley, it’s hard for a candidate to go hard left and survive.”
For Mackenzie to win, Franklin & Marshall pollster Berwood Yost predicted before the election, the key to victory was to “constantly harp on people’s dissatisfaction about the economy.”
His victory suggests that strategy worked.