Kamala Harris’ White House bid could hinge on one key part of Pennsylvania that she is all but sure to lose.
Beaver County could prove instrumental to her campaign, if past Democratic performances are anything to go by, but not by winning it – rather by losing it to Donald Trump by fewer votes.
The conservative, working-class community northwest of Pittsburgh has historically voted Republican in presidential elections.
In 2016, staggering losses in Beaver County helped put the final nail in the coffin for Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
But by 2020, President Joe Biden had manage to minimize the margins before his successful election. The county was where he chose to make his closing argument hours before Election Day.
Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro managed to clinch Beaver County in his 2022 gubernatorial run.
‘The race is really close,’ Shapiro told the New York Times.
‘Four, five, six hundred more votes in a place like Beaver County could be a real difference maker.’
He and his Democrat colleagues have been campaigning hard for Harris in the blue-collar territory.
The vice president also kicked off a bus tour of Pennsylvania in Beaver County in August.
However, there could be more work to be done for Harris if a local bakery’s highly anecdotal cookie poll is to be considered.
Kretchmars Bakery, which played host to Barack Obama in 2012, has been making batches of Trump and Harris branded cookies and recording sales as a tasty bellwether for November 5.
As of noon on Tuesday, Trump’s cookies were trouncing sales of Harris’- 2089 to 836.
But across 30 interviews conducted by the New York Times, the picture was much more mixed.
Donald Rea, 64, of Brighton Township painted a 36-foot-tall, 90-foot-wide Harris sign on his land overlooking the Ohio and Beaver Rivers.
He said that since creating the sign, he has had several people approach him to ‘come out of the closet’ to voice support for Harris.
But several residents expressed concerns over inflation and immigration, two sticking points throughout Harris’ campaign.
‘They’ve had the last four years,’ Meghan Stanislow, 45, said of the Democrats. ‘We’re barely making it month to month.’
She added that while she does not like Trump personally or his stance on abortion, she can not abide Harris’ ‘word salad’ and constant mentioning of her middle class roots.
Harris desperately needs to gain traction among male, working class voters and has sent her running mate Tim Walz on a charm offensive which recently saw him showing off his shooting skills on a farm 126 miles from Beaver County.
However, a video appealing to male voters was roundly mocked after it was released earlier this month with many claiming it reduced masculinity to ‘cringey’ stereotypes.
Former Pennsylvania Rep. Conor Lamb expressed his doubts about Harris’ campaigning in the area.
‘It might not be visible until the very end, but I can’t say I’m seeing the progress yet,’ he said.
He also acknowledged there is a risk that Harris could lose even more white working-class voters than her predecessors.
‘If it turns out that people are just so mad about inflation, or, you know, whatever issue it is, it certainly could go the other direction.,’ he said.