Southwest Pennsylvania Congressional District PVI changes

By Fester:

I am rethinking my initial analysis that Pennsylvania will be the most active Congressional battleground in 2010.  I had not anticipated the size of the Appalachia versus the rest of the state effect that actually occurred in the 2008 general election.  This will significantly change the Partisan Voter Indexes for a couple of Congressional districts which will move them out of the probably competitive zones to the barely competitive absent a mistress choking incident. 

The New York Times published this very interesting chart that depicts the counties where John McCain in 2008 outperformed George W. Bush in 2004.  The obvious conclusion is that the line follows the Appalachian Mountain ranges.  The northern edge of this zone is southwestern Pennsylvania.  This zone includes PA-4, 12, 14 and 18.  PA-4, 12 and 14 are Democratically held districts.  However PA-4 has been a slight Republican lean district, while PA-12 has been a lean Dem district and PA-14 is a heavy base Dem district.  PA-18 is a Republican District with a slight Republican lean and a very conservative Democratic registration advantage. 

Without pulling any precinct level data, I am making a couple of estimates on the Obama-McCain splits by Congressional District in SW PA and this area has become significantly more Republican leaning.  PA-4 which is represented by Dem. Rep Altmire probably went to McCain by five points, which means it is roughly a R+9 or R+10 district for a one year PVI.  This is a significant change from the previous R+3 rating.  It will probably be rated an R+7 district for 2010.  This SHOULD be a natural GOP target seat.  However I am not sure who is on the GOP bench for this district. 

PA-18 saw Obama underperform by 8 points in Washington County, 14 points in Westmoreland County, and overpeformed by 5 points in Allegheny County.  However the portions Allegheny County that are in the district underperformed the Obama margins that are seen in the Mon Valley, the East Hills suburbs and most importantly Pittsburgh.  I am guessing that McCain won the district outright and probably won it by a few points.  So for this cycle, PA-18 is probably an R+9 or so district.  This should be an easy GOP hold despite the large Democratic registration advantage in the district. 

Now moving over to the other side of the state, PA-13 which is a projected open seat as its current representative, Rep. Allyson Schwartz is rumored to be considering a run for the Senate.  PA-13 is in the Philly Burbs which went heavily Democratic.  PA-11, Kanjorski's district, is still a reliable Democratic tilt district and the scare he received should be sufficient to make sure he works his ass off for the next two years. 

I had initially anticipated eight heavily contested races in 2010.  Now I think we'll see three Republican challenges (PA-3, PA-4, PA-11), two Democratic challenges in PA-15 (Rep. Dent) and PA-6 (Rep. Gerlach) and then token challengers in PA-18, and PA-12.

Comments

[smintheus]

Sadly, Democrats never make a serious contest of PA-15. Local Dem office-holders don't run, and the bench isn't really strong anyway. Dent was highly vulnerable this year, but we had a challenger who was so mistrusted she could never have won. I've almost despaired of local Democratic leadership.