Katie McGinty is considering a run for the Senate.

[femmocrat]

http://triblive.com/news/adminpage/8729320-74/wolf-budget-mcginty#axzz3fsLjWBRW

Two weeks into a state budget impasse and six months into his first term, Gov. Tom Wolf faces the prospect of losing his chief of staff Katie McGinty to a U.S. Senate bid.

Wolf, a Democrat, confirmed during a visit Monday to Ross Elementary School that McGinty, a one-time gubernatorial primary foe, is weighing whether to seek the Democratic nomination to challenge U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey next year.

(snip)

Mike Mikus, spokesman for McGinty during her last campaign, said she attended a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee function at Martha's Vineyard this weekend. She will make a decision “soon,” Mikus said.

Already seeking the nomination is Joe Sestak, a former congressman who lost an open Senate seat to Toomey in 2010. Spokeswoman Danielle Lynch said “anybody who wants to get in should get in.”



Read more: http://triblive.com/news/adminpage/8729320-74/budget-state-tax#ixzz3fsMHuSQM

[longship]

1. Her environmental record is very strong.

Kathleen McGinty

R&

[femmocrat]

2. Yes, she is very well qualified.

I'm for Sestak, though. I kind of wish she had not decided to challenge him. Beating Toomey with all his corporate money will be challenging enough.

[Divernan]

3. I'm still for Sestak as well.

Last edited Thu Aug 13, 2015, 08:14 AM - Edit history (2)

The national Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has been desperately trying for months to get someone to run against Sestak in the primary - Allentown Mayor Ed Pawlowski being the most recent. They have got to promise any putative candidate a large sum certain to fund a primary and then general election campaign. Apparently their earlier choices didn't feel the amount was sufficient. Whatever $$$ the DSCC comes up with, the problem is that it comes with strings which take away said subsidized candidate's independence to legislate on behalf of their constituents, and not at the bidding of the DSCC and/or Senate leadership.

Katie is better qualified, education-wise than the previous 2 Sestak opponents being courted by the DSCC, but her close ties to Big Fracking make her as bad as Corbett.

I really admire Sestak for having the independence to put his Pennsylvania constituents ahead of the national party's demands, and especially for standing up to them re the Arlen Specter brouhaha. I think we are fortunate to have a person of his integrity, ability and experience running for Senate. I've seen it before at both state and national levels. Party hacks would rather lose than see someone from their own party, whom they can't control, take office. The worst experience was when I was working on the McGovern campaign. State and county Dem machines did squat all to support him. They hated him.

The ugliest example I personally saw of this quid pro quo demand from Democratic leadership was in the State House, back in the distant past (around 1995) when the state Dems just lost the House majority and Bill DeWeese was minority leader. Bill was determined to join the Rs to pass a legislative pay raise, but some of the Dem. reps knew they'd never win their next election if they went along with this. So Bill confronted them in front of the entire Dem. caucus (representatives & key staff). My boss was a Committee Minority Chairman who again said no to Bill, at which point Bill roared, "I got your brother a job on the Turnpike!" and my boss stood up, screamed back at him, "Well, go get my fucking brother to vote for the fucking pay raise!" and stormed out of the caucus. The next day, my boss was stripped of his minority committee chairmanship and entire staff. Our (staff) computers were moved to an empty room, where we sat for a very long two weeks with absolutely nothing to do, and sweated whether we would be fired as well.

It's insane, financially, because now Sestak and McGinty will each spend far too much money battling each other, whereas Toomey can hang onto his substantial, corporate-funded campaign dollars for the general election. And McGinty may well find that, should she win the primary, but lag too far behind Toomey in the polling in the general, the DSCC may welch on their promised funding, with the excuse that if they don't predict she can win, they'll divert their $$$ to another state's candidate. I always give directly to Dem. candidates - never contribute to allowing the party to strongarm candidates.