News & Brews August 2, 2022
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Shapiro outspends Mastriano on ads by nearly 10:1 since primary
PennLive reports that during the first 10 weeks of the general election campaign, Democrat gubernatorial nominee Josh Shapiro spent more than $12.6 million on broadcast TV, cable, and satellite, compared with Republican nominee Doug Mastriano’s $1.3 million. One GOP consultant noted, “It’s a significant advantage when you have the field to yourself because you have an opportunity to, one, define yourself; and two, to define your opponent.” Shapiro is doing both, with little airwaves pushback from Mastriano.
Third party candidates running for U.S. Senate, governor
Yesterday was the deadline for third-party candidates to file nominating petitions to get on the November ballot. The AP reports, “Three parties — the Keystone Party, the Libertarian Party and the Green Party — all have candidates who filed voter signatures for governor and U.S. Senate, according to the state’s online candidate list.” (The Keystone Party was begun by Libertarians who felt that party was moving too far to the right.) While third party candidates rarely draw significant support, in a close race, they could tilt the scale between the two major-party candidates.
Are national Republicans down on Oz? Depends on whom you ask
POLITICO reports that the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) “is privately sounding the alarm about physician Mehmet Oz’s bid for the Senate … while telling donors that the party still has a path to winning the majority without [Pennsylvania].” Yet, an NRSC spokesman claimed that “any implication that we don’t have full confidence in the Oz campaign and our chances of winning PA is false.”
PLCB officials got preference on lottery leftovers; doesn’t pass the ‘sniff test’
Several PLCB officials got first dibs on buying “high-end limited quantity wine or spirits” that were left over from limited-release lotteries “before the public even knew there were still bottles up for grabs,” PennLive reports. While the State Ethics Commission found no ethics violation, Sen. Mike Regan, chair of the Senate Law & Justice Committee, which oversees the PLCB, says the scenario doesn’t pass the “sniff test.” The PLCB has stopped the practice and launched an internal investigation. Of course, this is just the latest in a long (long) list of PLCB “boondoggles.”
Mastriano wins endorsement of (nearly all of) Pa.’s GOP U.S. House delegation
With the exception of Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Bucks County, every member of Pennsylvania’s Republican U.S. House delegation signed a letter endorsing Doug Mastriano for governor. The Post-Gazette observes, “It often goes unnoticed when a state’s Congressional delegation endorses their own party’s candidate for a statewide office, dismissed as party politics as usual. But in this race, Democrats have been trying to label Mr. Mastriano as too extreme even for his own party, and political analysts told the Post-Gazette after the primary that they expected many mainstream Republicans to offer tepid, quiet support. This backing, however, is public and emphatic.”