Craving Pennsylvania: GOP fights for Susan Wild’s seat to secure House control

Pennsylvania is the ultimate battleground for 2024, with the White House, Senate, and House all poised to flip based on how voters here cast their ballots. In this series, Pining for Pennsylvania: Unlocking the crucial Keystone State, the Washington Examiner will look at the demographics, politics, and key policies that have made Pennsylvania the must-watch state of the year. Part Three, below, looks at one of the most competitive House races in the country.

LANCASTER, Pennsylvania — Republicans are eyeing vulnerable seats held by Democrats to be flipped to maintain control of their slim majority in the House, with several running through the battleground state of Pennsylvania.

One of those seats is the district currently held by Rep. Susan Wild (D-PA), who was first elected in 2018. Since then, Wild narrowly eked out victories in both 2020 and 2022, making Pennsylvania’s 7th Congressional District one of the most competitive races of the 2024 cycle.

The high-stakes race has turned out a crowded field of Republican candidates looking to face Wild in November. Each of the three candidates — state Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, veteran Kevin Dellicker, and attorney Maria Montero — have criticized Wild as being a “career politician” and accused the three-term congresswoman of being out of touch with Pennsylvania voters.

“I think Susan Wild is an extreme progressive politician who has been masquerading as a moderate,” Mackenzie told the Washington Examiner in an interview. “And voters have figured that out, and it’s showing up in her vote totals that she keeps going down every single cycle.”

Although Wild won by a strong 10-point margin in 2018, the Pennsylvania Democrat won by only 3.8 points against Lisa Scheller in 2020, a much closer race than expected. That margin fell even smaller in 2022 when Wild defeated Scheller by just 2 points.

Now Republicans see the seat as ripe for a pickup opportunity.

“When you’re an incumbent and your numbers are heading south like that, that is a bad sign,” Mackenzie said.

To be sure, Mackenzie added, Wild will be a “formidable challenge.” But he, along with the other Republican candidates, have expressed confidence in their chances.

Central to each of the candidates’ campaigns is attacking Wild as being out of touch with Pennsylvania voters and attacking the incumbent’s voting record on issues such as the economy and immigration.

“She really worries too much about what progressives in Washington think and instead of what her constituents in the Lehigh Valley think,” Dellicker said. “And that’s causing her all sorts of problems.”

Dellicker specifically cited an instance in which Wild said she was “dismayed” to have Carbon County represented in her district after congressional maps were redrawn in Pennsylvania. Wild later apologized for those comments, during which she said the county had “drank the Trump Kool-Aid.”

However, some voters pointed to those statements as a reason to remove her from office.

“If she’s embarrassed to represent me, then I want someone who’s proud to represent me,” Gina Filer, a voter from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, told the Washington Examiner.

Other candidates have pointed to Wild’s vulnerability in the last two election cycles as an opportunity for Republicans to siphon away independent voters. Montero, a first-generation U.S. citizen with Peruvian ancestry, has positioned herself as being the most capable to win over unaffiliated voters as well as any Democrats who have become restless with their own party. Several voters also told the Washington Examiner they viewed Montero as the best candidate to win over Hispanic voters.

“We’re going to unify and then we are going to grow our party. We’re going to switch people to Republican,” Montero said at a campaign event on Sunday. “I’m the kind of person that they relate to. I mean, I live with them. I was a single mom. … That’s the kind of person I am. I really care about America. I love our country.”

The primary election is set to be a competitive race between the three candidates and only marks the beginning of an uphill battle for both parties to win control of the seat in November. The race has been deemed a toss-up by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, with Republicans at a slight advantage due to its Republican +2 rating.

Wild, for her part, has expressed confidence in her reelection chances, framing herself as a bipartisan candidate who can hold the seat in Democrats’ favor.

“I’m proud of my bipartisan record of working across the aisle to lower healthcare costs, protect workers’ rights, and improve access to affordable child care,” Wild told the Washington Examiner in a statement. “I have a strong history of fighting for Pennsylvania children, families, and seniors, and I look forward to earning their votes this year.”

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All 435 seats are up for grabs in 2024 as Republicans seek to hold their slim majority in the lower chamber. Of these, 42 are considered competitive, with most of those held by Democrats, giving the GOP a slight advantage as it prepares for the next election cycle.

However, of the 42 competitive seats, 17 are held by Republicans in districts that voted for President Joe Biden in 2020, compared to just five Democrats who must defend their seats in districts carried by former President Donald Trump. That means there are just enough vulnerable GOP-held seats to keep things competitive heading into the next election cycle.

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