Democrats appear to have secured control of the state House of Representatives, thanks to a special-election win Tuesday night in the 35th District, where Democrat Dan Goughnour was on track to best Republican Chuck Davis by a convincing margin.
Goughnour replaces the late Matthew Gergely, who died shortly before being sworn in for a second term representing the district. The 35th centers on McKeesport but also includes such Mon Valley communities as Clairton, Duquesne, Homestead, Munhall, South Versailles and White Oak.
“I’m humbled and grateful that voters have put their trust in me to serve the 35th District and carry on Matt Gergely’s legacy of service to this community,” said Goughnour in a statement. “I’m grateful to everyone who gave their time and resources to this campaign, and now I look forward to delivering real results for the Mon Valley.”
The Associated Press called the race for Goughnour, a McKeesport police officer and member of the community’s school board, at 9:24 p.m. — less than an hour-and-a-half after polls closed, and with Goughnour up by roughly two-to-one margins with almost three-quarters of precincts reporting.
Libertarian Adam Kitta was in the low single digits.
The result was essentially a foregone conclusion: Democrats hold a roughly two-to-one advantage in terms of voter registration in the district, 2024 Presidential contender Kamala Harris won it by a double-digit margin, and the House seat has been held by their party for decades. Gergely himself won the seat by a roughly 75-to-25 margin in the 2023 special election in which he first earned the seat.
When vote totals for the bulk of mail-in ballots were released shortly after 8 p.m. Tuesday, Goughnour had a 81-to-17 percent edge of nearly 2,000 votes, all but ending the contest before it began.
Democrats at the national level, who have been looking for good news in the aftermath of a crushing 2024 election season, were quick to seize on the outcome as a sign that their party is back.
In February, the newly elected chair of the Democratic National Committee, Ken Martin, launched a multistate tour with a door-knocking stop on Goughnour’s behalf. At the time, Martin said a Goughnour win would show “Democrats around the country that we’re willing to fight for our values at every single level.”
Martin revisited that theme Tuesday evening in a statement from the DNC, arguing that the win “secures the House majority for Pennsylvania Democrats so that they can stand up to Trump’s mayhem in Washington” while building stronger communities back home.
“Building the Democratic Party back begins in the states,” Martin said in a statement, “and down-ballot wins like [Goughnour’s] offer a powerful rebuke of Trump and Elon Musk’s MAGA agenda.”
Gergely’s death left the state House deadlocked, with Democrats and Republicans each holding 101 seats in the 203-member chamber. And neither party had much chance to select a champion to replace him: Speaker of the House Joanna McClinton moved to fill the vacant seat as quickly as possible, hoping to firm up Democratic control of the chamber with a representative from the solidly blue Monongahela Valley.
Goughnour was selected from a field of a half-dozen candidates in a vote of Democratic committeepeople; the selection of Davis took place in a less public manner, with a handful of party leaders making the selection.
Democratic allies celebrated the win. "We thank the many union members and volunteers who brought this home to help keep our Democratic State House Majority, and we look forward to working with Rep.-elect Goughnor," said a statement from the Allegheny-Fayette County Labor Council, an umbrella group of regional unions. "We miss our friend Matt Gergely but we know he is smiling tonight seeing his seat and the State House remaining in pro-union hands.”
Despite the national attention and the stakes for control of the House, the race itself was a low-wattage affair. Goughnour and Davis did not meet for a debate, and the race had little in the way of public rancor or advertising. State campaign finance records show that Davis’s campaign had raised roughly $7,150 by mid-March; Goughnour’s totals were not yet available.
The attention of many politicos was focused on another legislative special election — this one for Senate District 36 in Lancaster County, where Democrats sensed a possible upset in the making in the contest between their nominee, East Petersburg Mayor James Malone, and Republican County Commissioner Josh Parsons. While Republicans are assured of controlling the Senate regardless of that outcome, the race overshadowed the House contest as Republicans such as Elon Musk openly fretted about the outcome.
As of 10:50 p.m. Tuesday, a winner in that race had not been called, though Malone appeared to be leading by less than 500 votes and Democrats were declaring victory.
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Arts & Culture Reporter
