A citizen places a ballot in a box at the county clerk's office in Erie, Pennsylvania, on October 15, 2020. Image: Bonnie Jo Mount/The Washington Post via Getty Images
ERIE, Pa. – On a recent weeknight in Erie, Pa., the local minor league hockey team hosted its first playoff game in several years. The home team, the Erie Otters, played against the Kitchener Rangers from Ontario, Canada.
But even as fans watched the game on the ice, a different type of showdown wasn't far from Erie County residents' minds.
“If you go down another block or another street, you'll see Trump or Biden or something,” said Bekah Mook, 34, who was watching the game. “You can't even have a beer without someone mentioning whether you're a Democrat or a Republican.”
“It’s there everywhere you go,” she said.
Most counties around the country are predictably Democratic or Republican, but Erie County in northwestern Pennsylvania is what election observers call a “boomerang county.” It boomeranged from Democrats to Republicans and back again in the recent presidential election cycle.
The county elected former President Barack Obama twice, elected former President Donald Trump in 2016, and narrowly elected President Biden in 2020.
Now everyone is trying to predict what will happen this year.
“What happens to Erie, what happens to Pennsylvania.”
Biden won Erie County in 2020 by fewer than 1,500 votes, or 1.03 percentage points. In 2016, Trump's lead was less than 2,000 votes.
Mook, who works at a mental health clinic, is one of the voters who flipped. She comes from a family of Christian Republicans, and she once considered herself firmly in that camp. She supported Trump in 2016 primarily because of her opposition to abortion.
But as she watched Trump take office, her feelings changed.
“Now we're looking at other things. There's a lot of other issues than just abortion,” she said.
She was particularly concerned about President Trump's policy of separating immigrant families at the U.S.-Mexico border and footage of children being detained at border facilities.
“I have 19 nieces and nephews, but I don't have any children right now. I'm just a kid lover,” Mook said. “So when I see kids like that, I think, 'Oh, I don't like that.'
As for this year, Mook says he's still voting back and forth in the presidential election. She currently leans “60% Democratic.” Another Erie County voter who was in the arena that night, 22-year-old Ethan Haines, said he is an independent but is fully in favor of Biden this year. For him, democracy is about voting.
“I think Mr. Trump and his message are very indicative that he has no intention of relinquishing power if he ever gets it again,” Haines said.
If you go to the more rural parts of the county outside of Erie, you'll find that there are more conservative types of voters. After finishing breakfast at an old-fashioned diner in Girardeau, Pennsylvania, 66-year-old Tim Stephenson said he supports Mr. Trump.
“We can't live another four years of Joe Biden,” said Stevenson, a former township police officer who now owns an auto repair shop. “I don't think he has the ability to run an ice cream stand.''
What matters is the turnout
The chairs of Erie's local political parties have long histories in the county, and both know the location could be pivotal come November.
“Erie County is actually demographically very similar to the state,” explained Erie County Democratic Party Chairman Sam Talarico.
“We have urban centers, we have suburban areas, and as you go south of Interstate 90, it becomes rural,” he said. “That's why we're kind of a bellwether county. We're looking at what happens in Erie, what happens in Pennsylvania, and that's been the case in the last few elections.”
Talarico says her job this year is to increase voter turnout. That means the grunt work of campaigning, like door-knocking, phone-banking and voter registration.
“Both of these candidates have been in the White House and know who they are, so I think most people have already made up their minds,” he explained.
“So our real challenge is to find new voters and hopefully get them on our side,” Talarico said.
Voting by mail could make a difference
Across town at the local Republican Party headquarters, County Chairman Tom Eddy has a different goal. It's about getting more Republicans to vote by mail.
Democrats currently have a huge advantage when it comes to voting by mail. Biden won Erie in 2020 by just over a point, but received 75% of the county's mail-in votes. The same dynamic played out for Democrats in the 2022 midterm elections and 2023 state judicial elections.
That's a big problem for Republicans. Eddy said in very blunt terms that Republicans continue to lose elections they could have won because voters in his party don't believe in mail-in voting.
President Trump has repeatedly lied about voting by mail as a false reason for the rejection of a legal and widely used voting method in the state, and has loudly accused the voting method of being a major cause of voter fraud. The main reason is that Voting was the reason for the 2020 defeat. There is no evidence that there were any such problems with mail-in voting.
Eddy himself hasn't completely dismissed or dispelled false claims of mail-in voting fraud, but he insists it's time for Republicans to move forward. He says now is the time to play to win, and that must include accepting mail-in voting.
“There are still people who are adamantly against them (voting by mail). They say, 'Well, it's a fraud scheme.' And I said, 'Well, that's possible.' '' said Eddie. “But we have to play that game or we lose. We can't win elections without them.”
Both Eddy and Talarico believe there are advantages when it comes to voting by mail. Voting by mail gives voters more flexibility and increases turnout.
It will also allow party leaders to focus on efforts to “draw out votes.” Applications for mail-in ballots are public information, as is whether a ballot has been submitted. This means campaigns can directly contact voters and encourage them to cast their votes.
Voters can also check a box to have mail-in ballots automatically sent to them in all future elections, making them even more likely to vote in the future. This is a big help for the parties, and it's an area where Democrats currently enjoy a huge advantage. As a Republican, Eddie explains his options: “If we can get people to check it out; [box], that's the best thing in the world. ”
Lies about voter fraud fuel Republican skepticism
But Eddie knows he faces an uphill battle as he tries to spread the gospel of mail-in voting to Republicans. He described an incident he encountered while trying to hand out mail-in ballot applications at a Trump rally in Erie last summer.
“I left at 6:30 in the morning and went to everyone in line, all 10,000 people, and said, 'This is a mail-in ballot,' and I told them why. Those people said, 'No.' I said, 'Because one, Donald doesn't support it, and two, it's a scam,'' Eddie recalled.
He says he was able to get only about 300 people to register out of a crowd of thousands. President Trump's lies about widespread fraud in the 2020 election he lost are convincing.
That's why when you talk to Republican voters, it's easy to see that they distrust voting by mail.
“I think you should go to the polls with your license and prove who you are and vote. That's it,” said Tim Stevenson, an auto repair shop owner.
Stevenson plans to vote in person.
State Sen. Dan Laughlin, D-Erie, thinks that's largely down to chance. If there is bad weather or a flat tire on Election Day, you may be forced to stay home.
In 2020, Laughlin was a rare Republican in favor of mail-in voting, and said former President Trump was doing a disservice to the Republican Party by continuing to badmouth mail-in voting.
“If by chance you use this clip in an interview and it gets back to him and he hears it, I hope he hears it,” Laughlin said. “Because he's the only one who can fix it. Everyone else is working hard, right?”
If Republicans can't be competitive with mail-in voting, “we're going to wipe the clock,” Laughlin said.
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