Strategists say politicians will look at Fetterman's playbook for targeting working class
HARRISBURG (KDKA) - Pennsylvania's soon-to-be new governor comes from the Philly area. Nothing unusual about that. But our new U.S. senator? John Fetterman is from Braddock. Did that actually help his chances?
"Twenty years ago, I came to Braddock to start a GED program," Fetterman said during his victory speech, on brand, just as he had been all campaign.
Is Braddock the most famous borough of 1,700 people in all of America?
"All eyes are now on western Pennsylvania and Braddock in particular," said CBS News chief election and campaign correspondent Robert Costa.
"His playbook that lifted him in Braddock is now being looked at across the country by Democrats as a playbook about how to win back the working class, how to win back Trump supporters in places like western Pennsylvania," Costa added.
"People do like our politicians to be from Pennsylvania," said Democratic political strategist Brit Crampsie. "And then once they're from Pennsylvania, we're really partial to where they're from."
She said because more people are from Philly than anywhere else, the easy math long seemed to favor statewide candidates from out east. But John Fetterman changed that.
"He did a tour of every single county when he was lieutenant governor," Crampsie said.
"He wasn't relying on electoral math that said he needed to, you know, run up the numbers in western Pennsylvania and then he could ignore the rest of the state," Crampsie added. "He didn't ignore the rest of the state," including central Pennsylvania, where he's actually originally from: York County, down the road from Harrisburg. In other words, he's kind of from everywhere except Philly.
And Crampsie says that's fine.
"There's a lot of anti-Philadelphia sentiment statewide, whether that's fair or not," Crampsie said. "So I think coming from somewhere besides Philadelphia may have actually helped him statewide in particular, the many, many voters that cross party lines to vote for him on Tuesday."
