Dave McCormick beat Bob Casey with Trump, news and money

Aside from future President Donald Trump’s unexpected landslide victory, one of the most surprising results of Tuesday’s election was Republican Dave McCormick’s apparent victory over three-term U.S. Sen. Bob Casey Jr. (from the state of Pennsylvania).

Casey has not conceded the race, and it is possible that the narrow lead will trigger an automatic recount process in Pennsylvania after more votes are counted. But on Thursday, the Associated Press called the race for McCormick, and Casey faces significant obstacles to turning the tide.

» READ MORE: According to the AP, Republican Dave McCormick shockingly unseats longtime U.S. Sen. Bob Casey

Assuming the AP’s appeal is upheld, the result will be an earthquake in Pennsylvania politics. Casey, a moderate who often outperforms his party’s leading candidates, won six statewide elections in Pennsylvania, and his father was a eminent governor.

Christopher Nicholas, a veteran GOP strategist from Pennsylvania, said Casey’s popularity has been degenerating for months and that McCormick, a former hedge fund executive with gigantic money behind him, is well-positioned to take advantage of it.

“You always look at the incumbent president’s polling numbers and the challenger’s money,” said Nicholas, who worked on the campaigns of the delayed Sen. Arlen Specter. “Casey’s numbers kept dropping. He was the typical lead-from-behind type of guy. And when his poll numbers drop below 50, it’s always difficult for the incumbent to get back on top.”

All three of Casey’s victories in Senate races came during years of forceful Democratic Party power: the 2006 midterm elections, which were dominated by the growing unpopularity of the Iraq War and then-President George W. Bush; the re-election of former President Barack Obama in 2012; and the 2018 “Trump pushback cycle,” as Nicholas put it.

“Casey, unlike his other three Senate runs, had no wind at his back,” Nicholas said. “He never had to worry about a difficult October.”

So how did McCormick achieve victory? It all came down to Trump, the news and the money.

A complicated case of the coat

In 2012, Casey overtook then-President Barack Obama by 1.7 percentage points among Pennsylvania voters, and his margin of victory over GOP Senate candidate Tom Smith was 3.7 percentage points greater than Obama’s over Republican Mitt Romney.

This year, observers expected Casey to once again break his party’s lead, potentially allowing him to survive even if Vice President Kamala Harris narrowly loses to Trump in the Keystone State.

This formula failed to save Casey for two reasons. First, he didn’t outperform Harris. Casey is on track to win 48.5% of the vote, the same share Harris likely won in Pennsylvania. She may even end up with slightly fewer votes than her when the counting ends, which would be a shocking result considering Casey’s track record.

» READ MORE: Donald Trump won Pennsylvania with more votes than any other Republican candidate in history. Here’s how he did it.

Another problem for the incumbent president was that Trump did better than expected in Pennsylvania. In Wisconsin and Michigan, the other two blue wall states, Trump won by less than 1 percentage point, and Democrats retained their Senate seats. In Pennsylvania, Trump appears to have won by about 2 percentage points.

But there was still hope for Casey as McCormick, who had 48.9% of the vote as of Friday afternoon, underperformed compared to Trump, who had 50.5%. So even though Casey didn’t get more votes than Harris, he appears to have outperformed her by 1.5 percentage points in terms of his lead, largely due to his less popular opponent, and was still able to secure the win.

If Casey had outperformed Harris by any significant margin, he would have won re-election.

Casey passed Harris in the Rust Belt, but not in Philadelphia

Casey achieved better margins than Harris in several brownfield areas, such as Lackawanna County, which includes Casey’s hometown of Scranton.

But his margins were smaller than the vice president’s in the three counties that give Democratic candidates their biggest advantages in Pennsylvania: Philadelphia, Montgomery and Allegheny, including Pittsburgh.

In Philadelphia, for example, Casey has collected 78% of counted ballots so far, while Harris has collected 79%. That difference of 1 percentage point equates to more than 26,000 votes – although some of that difference is due to more votes in the presidential election.

Meanwhile, Bucks County, which continues to gain a reputation as one of the purplest counties in Pennsylvania, appears to be supporting Trump and Casey. Bucks is still missing thousands of provisional, military and overseas ballots. But if Trump’s lead continues, he will be the first GOP presidential candidate to carry the county since 1988.

Overall, Casey has a chance to win 12 of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties. However, his vote share dropped in every county compared to his last re-election campaign in 2018, a forceful year for Democrats.

His support dropped most dramatically in Greene and Fayette counties, deep in Trump country on the West Virginia border.

McCormick linked Casey to Kamala Harris

One reason Casey may not have overtaken Harris is that McCormick worked tirelessly to connect Casey with the vice president.

The Republican and his allies peppered the airwaves with ads calling Casey a “low-profile politician” who would be a “rubber stamp” for Harris’ agenda, noting that he voted with her and President Joe Biden’s administration almost all the time.

Meanwhile, Casey tried to defend himself by running ads touting his association with Trump’s protectionist trade policies.

(On the other hand, Casey’s aggressive ads attacking McCormick – questioning his ties to Pennsylvania and highlighting McCormick’s elderly hedge fund’s investments in China – may have been the reason the Republican couldn’t keep up with Trump).

» READ MORE: Why Sen. Bob Casey has changed his stance on abortion and same-sex marriage — and why his opponent isn’t saying much about it

Another reason Casey didn’t win the Democratic ticket may be that the incumbent president’s policies are now more in line with his party’s orthodoxy than when he began his Senate career as a “pro-life Democrat” who opposed modern gun laws and same-sex marriage. Although he still stands to the right of his party on energy issues, he currently supports marriage equality, a national guarantee of abortion rights, and modern gun control measures.

McCormick benefited from a Wall Street-funded super PAC

While McCormick had Trump’s coattails and an apparently effective communications strategy, none of it would have been enough without the money. And thanks to a Wall Street-backed super PAC, McCormick had plenty of it.

» READ MORE: Meet the billionaires supporting Republican Dave McCormick’s bid for the US Senate

Keystone Renewal PAC was the only outside spending group dedicated exclusively to the Pennsylvania Senate race. The enormous majority of the remaining money spent in the race came from the candidates’ campaigns and their parties.

People aspiring to be long-term leaders often have difficulty raising money. McCormick, however, is the former CEO of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, and has ties to some of the world’s richest people.

Many of Keystone Renewal’s donors know McCormick personally, and the PAC’s spending helped him become financially competitive in the race for more than $300 million.

According to the government organization Open Secrets, the PAC spent about $54 million. Of this, approximately $41 million was spent attacking Casey and $13 million was spent on strengthening McCormick.

Keystone Renewal’s largest donor was Ken C. Griffin, the billionaire owner of Citadel Securities, a financial services company. She also received millions from Jeff Yass, the richest man in Pennsylvania and a staunch supporter of the “school choice” policies that McCormick supports.

Staff writer Katie Bernard and art editor John Duchneskie contributed to this article.