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Will Harris sway PA voters? A Pittsburgh area Democrat and Republican each have a say

Published

2 years ago

July 24, 2024

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Will Harris sway PA voters? A Pittsburgh area Democrat and Republican each have a say

Left: Kathleen Madonna-Emmerling, Right: John Wink

Nate Smallwood for NPR

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Nate Smallwood for NPR

PITTSBURGH – Kathleen Madonna-Emmerling of Moon Township, a municipality that sits a few miles northwest of Pittsburgh, smiles as a server at local staple Primanti Brothers delivers a sandwich stacked higher than a double AA battery.

The story that locals like Madonna-Emmerling tell is that this Pittsburgh-style sandwich – layered with coleslaw, tomato slices, and French fries – was created so that local blue collar workers could drive large trucks and eat with one hand while on a shift.

The sandwich ties back to her family’s history – and that of many other residents in the area – of working in the steel industry and other blue collar jobs, many of which disappeared long ago. Her father was an auto worker involved in the local union. That led to her now working as a community organizer and “multi-hyphenate” political pot stirrer, she said.

When there were talks of closing a local school, she protested. She’s president of the library board and fought to keep a LGBTQ book on the shelves. She’s run for public office and trained activists to knock on doors at election time to shore up votes for Democrats.

But selling locals on President Biden at the top of the ticket has proven a struggle. His poor showing at the June debate with former President Donald Trump zapped a lot of energy. Then came the attempted assassination on Trump in nearby Butler, which caused a lot of “whiplash” in this area where many voters don’t adhere strictly to one party or the other.

“People are a little bit checked out. People are very tired. And we’re just trying to say, ‘OK , you’re going to be tired about the top of the ticket, but there’s still work to do,’” Madonna-Emmerling said, noting that some door-knocking efforts were slowed down after the shooting out of respect for Republican voters.

She couldn’t quite see a way forward.

Kathleen Madonna-Emmerling poses for a portrait outside a restaurant in Moon Township, Pennsylvania on July 23, 2024.

Nate Smallwood for NPR

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But then came the historic news that Biden was dropping out and making way for Vice President Harris to take his place. While she wasn’t necessarily calling for Biden to drop out, Madonna-Emmerling said she feels like his decision may prove a consequential one in Pennsylvania, which will again prove key to winning the White House.

“It was a literal exhalation, shoulders lowering,” Madonna-Emmerling said. “We’ve stopped the bleeding.”

More and more volunteers, she said, have called her in recent days about voter outreach efforts since Biden’s move.

“Plug in, let’s go,” she told them. “Get on the train. We’re all going together to the top.”

Their involvement in getting more voters to turn out could make all the difference in Moon Township, and other suburbs that surround Pittsburgh, which historically have voted for Republicans.

Trump won most of Moon Township’s 13 voting precincts in 2016 when he carried the state, according to Allegheny County Election Results data. And though most precincts again went his way in 2020, Democrats and Joe Biden picked up support in the town, when almost 2,000 more people voted. The same happened in small counties across the state, between here and Philadelphia and helped Democrats win the swing state back.

With the vice president now in the race, a new NPR poll found that the presidential race has hit a bit of a reset. Trump and Harris are now statistically tied, and some independent voters now say they are undecided,

Madonna-Emmerling feels that Harris’ campaign has injected new energy into Democrats, and she feels that the vice president’s background as a prosecutor is a winning combination and makes her an “ideal suburban candidate.”

Polling in the immediate aftermath of Biden’s endorsement for Harris shows she has more work to do with suburban voters, but also has more opportunity with folks in these areas who may now be undecided.

“Often in the suburbs, people want someone who is pro-public safety, pro-police,” Madonna-Emmerling said, adding that many in the area have family who are former military now working in law enforcement. “That can be a really hard barrier to overcome sometimes. And when you can say this is a clear case of a prosecutor against a felon, it’s a home run.”

But across town, a local Republican says, “We’ll see …”

Moon Township’s elected Republican tax collector John Wink, speaking to NPR from his backyard on a slightly muggy afternoon, said he believes the luster of Harris replacing Biden at the top of the ticket will wear off in the coming weeks.

“We’ll see if that lasts,” Wink said. “I think she’s a terrible candidate. When she actually ran for president, she couldn’t get votes.”

John Wink poses for a portrait outside his home in Moon Township, Pennsylvania on July 23, 2024.

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The core issues that Wink said he feels matter most to voters in this part of Pennsylvania – how they are currently experiencing inflation and securing the U.S.-Mexico border – still favor Trump.

Wink, who serves on the GOP’s state committee, has lived in the Pittsburgh area since he was two years old. His father was once mayor of Hampton Township, north of the city. Wink said he started working on campaigns, stuffing envelopes and putting mailers together for candidates, as early as 15 years old.

And his wife serves on the library board alongside Democrat Madonna-Emmerling.

Residents and voters here are by and large happy with how the town is run, regardless of the party affiliation of those running the local government, he feels. The roads are well maintained and the police force is good, he added.

It’s Pennsylvania’s status as a swing state, closely watched by national politics, that makes living here interesting from a political perspective, Wink said.

“I’m glad Pennsylvania is a swing state, much more interesting than if it was one way or the other,” Wink said. “It’s a whole lot more fun.”

One of his gauges for how elections might go is looking at campaign signs in front yards.

“I kind of thought Trump was in trouble in 2020 because I was seeing too many Biden signs, much more so than in 2016, where there were very little in the way of Hillary signs,” Wink remembered.

His verdict right now? It’s too early. There aren’t that many signs out yet, Wink said, but he’s still confident Trump will win.

So what are the keys for Trump and Harris here?

Wink said many local Republicans are excited to vote for Trump again, though he said he wished the party had nominated a younger candidate.

He would’ve liked to see Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis or former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley be the nominee. But Trump won the primaries, and Wink plans to vote for him.

Moon Township a suburban town in Allegheny County on July 24, 2024.

Nate Smallwood for NPR

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As for whether Moon Township and areas nearby will vote for Trump or Harris, if she becomes the nominee as expected, Wink and Madonna-Emmerling have a similar view.

Families and seniors on fixed incomes here are struggling with the cost of groceries and other costs of living. Under Trump, “things were humming along pretty well,” Wink said, and if Republicans can communicate that message and get their lower-propensity voters to turn out, the election will be theirs.

Madonna-Emmerling thinks voters here will want a candidate to be honest and relatable and Harris fits the bill.

She says people in this community work hard and care about their families and those around them. Speaking authentically to that could motivate those among them who are non-voters to head to the polls.

“Don’t be fake,” Madonna-Emmerling advised. “We have a strong bull**** detector.”

The audio version of this story was produced by Taylor Haney and edited by Gabriel Spitzer.

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Supreme Court blocks redrawing of New York congressional map, dealing a win for GOP

Published

3 hours ago

March 2, 2026

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Supreme Court blocks redrawing of New York congressional map, dealing a win for GOP

The Supreme Court

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The Supreme Court on Monday intervened in New York’s redistricting process, blocking a lower court decision that would likely have flipped a Republican congressional district into a Democratic district.

At issue is the midterm redrawing of New York’s 11th congressional district, including Staten Island and a small part of Brooklyn. The district is currently held by a Republican, but on Jan. 21, a state Supreme Court judge ruled that the current district dilutes the power of Black and Latino voters in violation of the state constitution.

GOP Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, who represents the district, and the Republican co-chair of the state Board of Elections promptly appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the justices to block the redrawing as an unconstitutional “racial gerrymander.” New York’s congressional election cycle was set to officially begin Feb. 24, the opening day for candidates to seek placement on the ballot.

As in this year’s prior mid-decade redistricting fights — in Texas and California — the Trump administration backed the Republicans.

Voters and the State of New York contended it’s too soon for the Supreme Court to wade into this dispute. New York’s highest state court has not issued a final judgment, so the voters asserted that if the Supreme Court grants relief now “future stay applicants will see little purpose in waiting for state court rulings before coming to this Court” and “be rewarded for such gamesmanship.” The state argues this is an issue for “New York courts, not federal courts” to resolve, and there is sufficient time for the dispute to be resolved on the merits.

The court majority explained the decision to intervene in 101 words, which the three dissenting liberal justices summarized as “Rules for thee, but not for me.”

The unsigned majority order does not explain the Court’s rationale. It says only how long the stay will last, until the case moves through the New York State appeals courts. If, however, the losing party petitions and the court agrees to hear the challenge, the stay extends until the final opinion is announced.

Dissenting from the decision were Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Writing for the three, Sotomayor said that if nonfinal decisions of a state trial court can be brought to highest court, “then every decision from any court is now fair game.” More immediately, she noted, “By granting these applications, the Court thrusts itself into the middle of every election-law dispute around the country, even as many States redraw their congressional maps ahead of the 2026 election.”

Monday’s Supreme Court action deviates from the court’s hands-off pattern in these mid-term redistricting fights this year. In two previous cases — from Texas and California — the court refused to intervene, allowing newly drawn maps to stay in effect.

Requests for Supreme Court intervention on redistricting issues has been a recurring theme this term, a trend that is likely to grow. Earlier last month the high court allowed California to use a voter-approved, Democratic-friendly map. California’s redistricting came in response to a GOP-friendly redistricting plan in Texas that the Supreme Court also permitted to move forward. These redistricting efforts are expected to offset one another.

But the high court itself has yet to rule on a challenge to Louisiana’s voting map, which was drawn by the state legislature after the decennial census in order to create a second majority-Black district. Since the drawing of that second majority-black district, the state has backed away from that map, hoping to return to a plan that provides for only one majority-minority district.

The Supreme Court’s consideration of the Louisiana case has stretched across two terms. The justices failed to resolve the case last term and chose to order a second round of arguments this term adding a new question: Does the state’s intentional creation of a second majority-minority district violate the constitution’s Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments’ guarantee of the right to vote and the authority of Congress to enforce that mandate?
Following the addition of the new question, the state of Louisiana flipped positions to oppose the map it had just drawn and defended in court. Whether the Supreme Court follows suit remains to be seen. But the tone of the October argument suggested that the court’s conservative supermajority is likely to continue undercutting the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

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Map: Earthquake Shakes Central California

Published

12 hours ago

March 2, 2026

Press Room

Map: Earthquake Shakes Central California

Note: Map shows the area with a shake intensity of 3 or greater, which U.S.G.S. defines as “weak,” though the earthquake may be felt outside the areas shown. All times on the map are Pacific time. The New York Times

A minor earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 3.5 struck in Central California on Monday, according to the United States Geological Survey.

The temblor happened at 7:17 a.m. Pacific time about 6 miles northwest of Pinnacles, Calif., data from the agency shows.

As seismologists review available data, they may revise the earthquake’s reported magnitude. Additional information collected about the earthquake may also prompt U.S.G.S. scientists to update the shake-severity map.

Source: United States Geological Survey | Notes: Shaking categories are based on the Modified Mercalli Intensity scale. When aftershock data is available, the corresponding maps and charts include earthquakes within 100 miles and seven days of the initial quake. All times above are Pacific time. Shake data is as of Monday, March 2 at 10:20 a.m. Eastern. Aftershocks data is as of Monday, March 2 at 11:18 a.m. Eastern.

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US says Kuwait accidentally shot down 3 American jets

Published

15 hours ago

March 2, 2026

Press Room

US says Kuwait accidentally shot down 3 American jets

The U.S. and Israel have been conducting strikes against targets in Iran since Saturday morning, with the aim of toppling Tehran’s clerical regime. Iran has fired back, with retaliatory assaults featuring missiles and drones targeting several Gulf countries and American bases in the Middle East.

“All six aircrew ejected safely, have been safely recovered, and are in stable condition. Kuwait has acknowledged this incident, and we are grateful for the efforts of the Kuwaiti defense forces and their support in this ongoing operation,” Central Command said.

“The cause of the incident is under investigation. Additional information will be released as it becomes available,” it added.

In a separate statement later Monday, Central Command said that American forces had been killed during combat since the strikes began.

“As of 7:30 am ET, March 2, four U.S. service members have been killed in action. The fourth service member, who was seriously wounded during Iran’s initial attacks, eventually succumbed to their injuries,” it said.

Major combat operations continue and our response effort is ongoing. The identities of the fallen are being withheld until 24 hours after next of kin notification,” Central Command added.

This story has been updated.