The Dispatch Podcast - As Goes Pennsylvania | Interview: Charlie Dent

Episode Date: November 4, 2024

Charlie Dent, former GOP representative and senior policy adviser at DLA Piper, joins Jamie to discuss how Harris could win Pennsylvania and what motivates voters in swing states. The Agenda: —Harris’ chances in collar counties —As Northhampton county goes —Swing states, post-Dobbs —The Madison Square Garden rally —When will we get Pennsylvania results? —Trump’s illiberalism —January 6 —Moderating on abortion Show Notes: —Interview with Hugh Hewitt The Dispatch Podcast is a production of The Dispatch, a digital media company covering politics, policy, and culture from a non-partisan, conservative perspective. To access all of The Dispatch’s offerings—including members-only newsletters, bonus podcast episodes, and weekly livestreams—click here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Dispatch podcast. I'm Jamie Weinstein. My guest today is former Republican Pennsylvania Congressman Charlie Dent. He is currently a senior policy advisor at DLA Piper. He is a vice president at the Aspen Institute, a founding member and a senior advisor to our Republican future. And a family friend. I come from the district that he used to represent, an Allentown, Pennsylvania and he has been a friend of my families for many years. I didn't know it most of my life, but when he was elected to Congress, I met him and have talked with him over the years. He is a very timely guest because he knows the ins and outs of Pennsylvania, which will probably be the state that everyone is focused on tomorrow during the presidential election to see who will

win the presidential race. So we get into what to look for in Pennsylvania, what he's seeing on the ground, why he decided to support Kamala Harris for president, and much more. I think you're going to find this episode not only timely, but interesting and useful as you tune into the presidential race tomorrow. So without further ado, I give you former congressman Charlie Den. Former Congressman Charlie Dead, welcome to the Dispatch Podcast. Hey, great to be with you, Jamie. Well, we are recording this on Friday.

This will be published on Monday the day before the presidential election. And on the presidential election, the day of the president, everyone's going to be looking at one state mainly. I talk about a few others, but Pennsylvania is the state that I think the eyes of the country will be on. So I want to start just by getting your sense of what is happening in the state and on the ground. What do you view as the state of the race right now in Pennsylvania? Yeah, you know, obviously it's very tight. You know,

according to all the public polling, it seems a very tight race. It seems to me, though, that, you know, I keep hearing stories this week that women seem to be turning out in larger numbers, which if you're on Team Harris, that's probably good news. And so I'm just, I'm hearing that on the ground. I'm not sure if it's backed up by empirical data, but that's what's being said. But I'll tell you right now, the Harris campaign, they need to do extremely well in the Philadelphia media market. And particularly the Collar counties of Philadelphia, Bucks, Montgomery, Chester, and Delaware counties. She needs to run the score up there. She also needs to do extremely well in Philadelphia, although there is concern that she might not get the

margin she needs out of Philadelphia. She'll win it big, but she needs to win it very big to the extent that there is an erosion of support for Harris among African-American males and Hispanics, that could cut into her margin in the city. So she'll have to do better in the suburbs around Philadelphia, around Allentown, Bethlehem, Harrisburg, and Pittsburgh. She'll really need to run up the score there as well as in the capital region. So that is really her challenge. Because I do think upstate Trump is strong, clearly. And if you remember what happened in Pennsylvania in 2020, Donald Trump underperformed in 66 out of 67 counties relative to 2016. And to be more specific, Biden won the four-collar counties of Philadelphia by a margin of about

285,000 votes. Hillary Clinton won them by about 185,000. So you can see the 100,000 vote differential. Trump won in 16, Pennsylvania by 44,000 votes. Biden won it in 2020 by 81,000 votes. But the question is, can Harris do better than Biden in those collar counties and also in other communities? Can she erode Trump's margin of victory in the states where he is strong similar to what Biden did in 2020? And we don't know the end. I would say, I'll make a prediction, though, and it's one of the few predictions I'll make. It's actually two. That whichever candidate wins Northampton County, which is where Bethlehem and Eastern Arm. And that was part of my old congressional district. Whichever candidate wins that

county will win Pennsylvania and therefore win the presidency. But watch that county because it's one, and same with Erie County, Pennsylvania. But Bethlehem is probably, Northampton is probably a better bellwether than Erie, though. But look at those two counties because remember, Obama won them in 12, Hillary won them and Trump won them in 16. Biden won them in 2020. that county has been really good at determining the winner. And so watch that county. Now, I also expect that Harris might have an erosion of support up in Lackawanna County where Scranton is. Remember, and that's where Biden is from, Scranton. Although, but Biden did marginally better than Hillary Clinton did up there. Although I think Hillary Clinton did actually

better in the city of Scranton than Biden did. So, but it's a long way of saying. That's a very white ethnic area. A lot of Italians, Irish, Lithuanians up there. And I don't, and I don't not so sure that Harris will play as well. I think that county could actually go red. The neighboring county where Wilkesbury is, Luzerne County, has already gone full Republican in 2016 and 2020. I think that Blackawanna County, that's where Casey lives as well, I think that county is probably going to go red this time. That means Harris has to make up votes, like again, in these suburban areas, particularly where there are a lot of college-educated voters, she's going to have to really own the score. You mentioned the Bellwether of North Hampton,

in when I hear these names, my family is my region or my family is from. Is there an animating issue that you think motivates these voters or motivates them not to vote, that they get turned off to vote and don't come out for a certain candidate? Yeah. Look, if you ask typical voters, what's their big issue? They'll tell you it's the economy. But I think probably the greatest motivating issue that's really motivating voters is abortion. And I saw an interesting data point in a Mullenberg College morning call poll a couple weeks ago for my old congressional district, which is probably the swingiest congressional district in the swingiest state. Okay, so you look at that, and what I found fascinating was that on the question of abortion,

73 percent of voters in that district thought that, this is a dead even district in terms of registration, 73 percent thought that abortion should be legal most or all the time. 17% said it should be illegal most or all the time. Now, when I served, it was probably like about a 55-40 ratio. Now, so here we are post-obs. It's clear that that issue has really changed in terms of how people self-identify. And based on what I'm seeing on the ground and what I've seen in polls too, it seems to be a motivating issue, even though it might not be the top issue for most voters. So keep an eye on that.

And I think that's a really, I can't, I can't state that enough. Now, of course, Harris is a relatively new candidate. She's not as well defined. Trump has a low ceiling, but Harris has, I think, a little bit more growth potential. But I'm hesitant to go out there and say one candidate, the other, is going to win. You know, like, all these polls, Jamie, you know how this was in 2016 and 2020. They undersampled non-college educated voters. Now, in 2024, are they oversampling them?

And which I don't know the answer to that question. Well, let me ask you. You mentioned the economy, as often in the case, the number one issue for voters. This is a pretty, and I feel like both parties are talking past each other. It is true that the economy, GDP growth and the S&P 500 are very strong. It may be unusually strong where people expected it to be when the Fed started raising rates. On the other hand, you know, ordinary voters who might not have, you know, that much invested in the stock market see prices that have gone up. And while, inflation has decreased, it hasn't lowered prices. It's just the rate has gone up. How do voters weigh these two sides of the economic question? Well, the economic angst is clearly driven by inflation, by high prices. And you're right. Inflation spiked very precipitously a couple of years ago. And while inflation has abated, you know, those high prices haven't come down. And so people are still kind of dealing with sticker shock, particularly as it relates to groceries and housing. And, of course, the Lehigh Valley region where I'm from in Pennsylvania, and much of eastern

Pennsylvania, there's been a lot of population growth. And there's increased demand for housing. And as you know, with higher interest rates, limited supply, many people are locked into their homes as they are with very low interest rates and they're not selling. So there's a lack of inventory and there's real pressure, particularly on younger voters or younger people who are trying to get into homes, but just they either can't afford to down payments or they can't afford the house. They're really struggling and trying to, it's just not easy finding houses, particularly in the eastern part, I would say particularly in the eastern, southeastern part of the state. So I think that's what's driving much of the economic angst. Now, each candidate saying they're going to

try to bring prices down. Harris is talking about, you know, price gouging or price controls. And Trump says he's going to magically lower prices, well, imposing a price. across the board tariffs. So neither side really has a great answer to this, but that's driving the yanks, and that's not playing to the advantage of the Democrats because they're the party in power. Can you speak a little bit to the Puerto Rican community

has obviously taken a bigger role in people talking about it on the media ever since the Madison Square Garden rally where the comedian Tony Hitchcliffe made some jokes that probably were not appropriate for any political campaign maybe any time, but certainly not a presidential campaign. Do you think they could be, the Puerto Rican community could be determinative? How big is the Puerto Rican community in Pennsylvania?

Yeah, those jokes did not land well in Allentown. In fact, the city of Allentown is about 55% Hispanic. Now that Hispanic population, it is predominantly, last I checked, it was probably the Hispanic population, about 70% Puerto Rican, and then the second largest groups are Dominicans. But it's probably fair to say that all Latinos from the Caribbean were deeply offended by those remarks.

And in Allentown, Bethlehem, Redding, and Lancaster, you have especially strong and large Hispanic populations. Again, mostly Puerto Rican populations. Philadelphia also has a significant population. But my old congressional district was probably in the top six in terms of a number of Puerto Ricans in the country. that mine and the one in Lancaster Redding were two of the largest two in the top ten so I think the Hispanic vote

is going to be consequential and I think the Trump campaign made a major error by bringing that comedian on to call Puerto Rico a floating island of garbage or whatever he said really was a big

error from what I can tell and it was because Trump was in Allentown just a couple days ago he was there a couple days ago and there were certainly that was all the talk because that was two days after the Madison Square Garden performance. And in fact, by the way, Kamala Harris is coming to Allentown on Monday.

Allentown becoming the center of politics. We're talking how close this race is in Pennsylvania. And obviously one of the criticisms back during the vice presidential search is that Kamala Harris didn't pick Josh Shapiro to be her running mate. Would this race be materially different in Pennsylvania if Josh Shapiro was the running mate? short answer is I think the answer is yes. At the time, I said that I thought that Josh Shapiro was the obvious choice for vice president. And people said, why? I said because of Pennsylvania. She needs to run up the score in the Philadelphia media market. He's especially strong there. You know, if you look at where Josh Shapiro won and Joe Biden won, Josh Shapiro won in a lot more places than Biden did. And if you look at Minnesota, the map of Minnesota, and you see where Joe Biden won and Tim Walts ran, they basically won in the same places. And so, And so I thought, and I know Tim Wallace, I'm a friend of his, and we served together for 12 years. We went to Afghanistan together, got stuck at the Boggham Basin a snowstorm, so we know each other.

But I think that Shapiro would have brought more value to the ticket. Not that people vote for number two, but I think it would have given more of a permission structure to some of these wavering Republicans and independents who just don't like Trump, but quite can't get there on a Democrat, that Shapiro would have given that extra edge. I think he certainly would have, and should Kamala Harris lose the election, I think people are going to look at that decision and maybe question it. Well, you just said you know Tim Walls and you served with him. What do you make of the person you know versus what has become the media perception of Tim Walls? Yeah, well, but I knew Tim. As a Democrat in Congress, he was pretty moderate.

You know, he had a strong Second Amendment record. he was, and I remember when he was running for governor. I remember chatting with him, and he was getting a lot of pressure from the left wing of his party. He wasn't left enough. And so, okay, so he wins that nomination, becomes governor. And I think he, I think it's probably fair to say that he governed, he was, he was a more progressive governor than he was a congressman. And so that's kind of how I knew Tim. So I really haven't had a lot of contact with him since 2018. And I know Josh Shapiro well, too. But, but that was my perception. More, more of a moderate congressman, a little bit populist, but more moderate. But probably he inched over a few clicks to the left when he became governor of the state of Minnesota. Just on a technical basis on election night, are we going to get results quicker in Pennsylvania than we did four years ago? I mean, when will we know who won Pennsylvania?

Well, as you recall, in 2020, it took us until Saturday after the election to get the final outcome. And unfortunately, the Pennsylvania General Assembly failed to pass a law that would allow for the pre-canvassing or processing of those mail-in votes. They cannot process those votes until 7 a.m. of Election Day. And right now, last I checked, there was well over a million mail-in ballots. Now, that's the bad news. The good news is during the pandemic, I think we had significantly more mail-in ballots than we do now. And again, that was our first time. 2020 was our first experience in Pennsylvania dealing with mail-in voting on this scale. No excuse absentee voting is what it is. And so it took us until Saturday. I don't think it'll

take that long this time. But I do think it will take a couple days. It might take us into Wednesday or Thursday, perhaps. I don't think it'll go out as far as Friday or Saturday. I'm hoping it will be on sooner. They're better at, I think they are better now at processing, canvassing than they were. And also, remember, too, on these mail-in ballots, Democrats in Pennsylvania voted by mail at a rate about three-to-one relative to Republicans. There's a three-to-one ratio. And so if you remember what happened in 2020, Donald Trump was up on election day.

He had more votes than Biden. But when you looked at the massive numbers of mail-in votes, that had not been counted, Democrats had cast those at a rate of three to one. And then, of course, you know, we saw the red mirage blue wave. That's what happened. And then Biden won by about 81,000 votes. So I think we might have a little bit of that. But as I said, you know, the Republicans have closed the gap a bit on mail and voting. Democrats still voting much stronger at that level, but not nearly to the extent they did in 2020. The advantage has been cut. Why does the legislator not pass laws like some other states where you can start processing these

sometimes even before the election? Oh, you know, it's a great question. It's just the dysfunction. When the Senate's controlled by Republicans, the House is controlled by Democrats. And each side, when they try to pass a bill, they add poison pills, and they just can't reconcile. You think they could just clean this up in a conference committee, you know, clean out the garbage and just allow for the pre-canvassing. But it's become enormously politicized.

And I'm not so sure that some Republicans and, you know, and Trump, in particular, particular, wanted them necessarily to fix this, because I think he wants to be able to complain after the, you know, to say that, you know, that, oh, they're cheating again. And look at this, you know, I have the lead and now I'm losing the lead. I think there's some of that, the politics that's also infected this issue in Harrisburg. During the Volvo Fall Experience event, discover exceptional offers and thoughtful design that leaves plenty of room for autumn adventures. And see for yourself how Volvo's legendary safety brings peace of mind to every crisp morning commute.

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What was your reasoning behind supporting the vice president? Well, my reasoning was that Donald Trump is really not a conservative. He's an illiberal populist. And I happen to think he's unfit for office. I've actually met him. I've been in meetings with them. I've seen it firsthand. I've seen the ADD, the impulse control issues, the narcissism.

on a Titanic scale, all wrapped in a volcanic temper. He has zero interest in public policy. You know, he continues to make stunningly disqualifying comments, just like he did yesterday about Liz Cheney and talking about, you know, putting her in front of a firing squad. And then now we're debating whether or not he meant to execute her or not. I mean, I mean, seriously, these are the kinds of conversations. Well, in fairness, Congress, I do think that not to defend him

and it makes it any better. he was talking about put her in the army and throwing her in Afghanistan or something like that. Yeah, I guess the whole thing is bizarre. And he's just, but he continues to want to go after his enemies. That seems to be the point. He's just, and on economic policy, again, from a conservative standpoint, there's nothing conservative at all about across the board, across the board tariffs at 10 to 20 percent and virtually everything coming into this country from everywhere. This is going to protect the privilege to you at the expense of the many. This will be inflationary.

This will be enormously detrimental to American manufacturing and agriculture. And, you know, as a conservative, I just don't understand how anybody can stand there with a straight face and say, this is great. This is the hardcore AFL-CIO policy, frankly. That's where they want to be. And so some of us as Republicans just think that, you know, we have to respect, we have to have some respect for free markets. We also should, of course, respect the rule of law.

constitutional order. Many of us as center-right or conservative people believe that, you know, that January 6th was an abomination. And I'm leading an organ, I'm one of the leaders of an organization called Our Republican Legacy, established by former senators Jack Danforth and Bill Cohen and Alan Simpson. We lay out five principles. The Constitution, rule of law, constitutional order. We're, you know, we thought January 6th was an abomination. We're for the union, like our founder, Abraham Lincoln, who wanted to keep our great country. together and not divide it. We're for free markets. We're against these types of across-the-board broad-based tariffs that are inflationary and will be economically destructive. We're for a

robust national security posture that embraces allies and rejects. You know, brutal autocrats like Vladimir Putin who have territorial ambitions on democratic nations. And we also think we have to have a conversation about fiscal responsibility once again, and neither party is talking about that. So these are the principles that we think sustained the Republican Party for 170 years. Maga's roots are rather shallow, and they've been around for about 10 years, and that's rather thin rule what they're pushing with this illiberal populism, nativism, isolationism, protectionism, and at times nihilism. I mean, that's what they're pushing, and we think that's a dead end. How many other Republicans do you think there are like you in Pennsylvania?

I mean, will Republicans who turned on Trump be potentially a deciding factor, or is it a small number of dissenters. I think it's about 10%. And that's one thing I'm looking at in all this polling data. I just saw a poll the other day suggesting that, you know, Harris had about 94% of the Democratic vote and Trump about 90% of the Republican vote. And it seems to me that Pennsylvania is a closed primary state. And you may remember that Nikki Haley secured around 17% of the vote statewide in a closed primary, several weeks after she had dropped out of the campaign, and in the Collar counties of Philadelphia, she was doing better than 20% of the Republican vote. So I guess what I'm suggesting is that there are a lot of dispirited, dissatisfied Republicans who do not want to vote for Donald

Trump. Now, whether or not they vote for Kamala Harris is another matter. Some of them may, some of them may not, but they clearly are, many of them are going to take a walk on this at the top of the ticket. And remember what happened in 2020. While Donald Trump was losing the state by 81,000 votes, we had statewide row offices, broader general and treasurer, one an open seat and the other defeating an incumbent, one winning by 300,000 votes, one by 100,000 votes. My point is, Republicans down ballot, not named Donald Trump,

were doing rather well in Pennsylvania in 2020, in the legislature, in the Congress, and certainly in the statewide row offices. and so that could happen again where you have a lot of Republicans who just don't vote at the top of the ticket or vote for Harris and then vote Republican down ballot

the place to check. By the way, we saw that happen in other states too. Congressman, you mentioned January 6th and I wonder, you're talking to your colleagues, you know, they was outraged on that day. Most of them in the House have decided to rally around Donald Trump. How did they get from outrage?

I brought this up with Hugh Hewitt in my podcast with him and how he justifies his vote. You know, that three hours in particular where Donald Trump was in the dining room off the Oval Office, he got a call from Kevin McCarthy, and he said, well, it seems like these people care more about the election than you. He was told about his vice president being under threat. He goes, so what? How do your colleagues in the House who are backing Trump, how did they get around and rationalize a day they were so angry about at the moment? Well, I think they've rationalized it because their voters. have nominated Donald Trump once again. I think that's how they do it. And frankly, I think Kevin McCarthy made a mistake by letting Trump off the mat when he went down to Mar-a-Lago a few weeks

after those events of January 6th and more or less very the hatchet. And look, there are only maybe 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump. I can assure you there was a lot more support in the House Republican Conference for impeachment than there were votes. They just didn't they just didn't do it. And then, of course, you know, the Senate had the chance and then they walked away from it. They could have put an end to all this. But I think that's going to be one of the great regrets of many of these members, particularly if Trump loses again this time. If he loses again this time, I mean, at some point, Republican Party has to get focused on winning again. You know, Trump, unfortunately, has made losing great again for the, he's done that.

I mean, since you look at what happened in 2018, we got wiped out, 20. the House, that is, 2020, who's the Senate, who's the presidency, 2022. Republicans significantly underperform in the midterm when they shouldn't have. So you have to start asking yourself, you know, why would they continue to back this guy? And you can look at the Democrats. I give them a lot of credit. They had a problem with Joe Biden at the top of their ticket. They're serious about winning.

They saw the down-ballot damage. They saw that he probably wouldn't win the White House. And they replaced them. And people, and some people are saying, oh, isn't that nasty? Well, that's what that's what political parties do. They exist to win, and you win to govern. And it seems that the Republican National Committee is more concerned about placating and ameliorating Donald Trump, keeping him happy rather than win elections.

And we all know that if Nikki Haley were the candidate right now, he'd probably be walking away with this election. Where do you see the future of the Republican Party, both if Donald Trump wins on one side and if he loses? I mean, is there a normal Republican Party that comes out in 2028 with a normal Republican presidential candidate, or is MAGA in control? Well, right now MAGA is clearly in control, but the Republican Party is divided. It is not evenly divided, but it is divided nonetheless.

If he loses, I think, at least I believe, that the conversation about the future of the party will take on added importance, because we'll be in the wilderness, at least in terms of the presidency, losing again. And I think what would happen is that would force us, you know, to talk about some things I just laid out. Do we want to be a party based on principles? And I'm not naive. And I don't think most of us are naive that we're going to go back to where we were. But we know that we need to get to a better place. And in the MAGA agenda of, you know, isolationism, protectionism, nativism, I just don't see this as a winning recipe long term. And so, and again, rather than having a party

really be about, well, really loyalty to one individual and whatever he happens to believe on a given day. We need to get back to guiding and sustaining principles like those that I mentioned earlier that sustained us for 170 years and frankly can lead us into the future. Because those principles I laid out, those would not only be embraced by most Republicans, but I have a lot of independence. And I would argue in a whole bunch of Democrats. But we have to become a more broad-based party once again. Also, I would suggest that we do probably need to moderate on the abortion issue. And this is an issue that post-obs, you know, Republicans need to come to the realization that with some of our colleagues in the states around the country are doing passing these abortion bans

with no exceptions, with no exceptions, six-week ban, no exceptions other than the life of the mother. Well, guess what? Those probably enjoy the support of about 5% of the public. On the wrong side of that issue. And then people say, well, our problem is a messaging problem. It's communication problem. I say, no, it's not. It's a policy problem. We have to fix the policy. And so that's another issue. and at least Trump, he's trying to moderate on that issue, but he's an imperfect messenger, given where he was on Roe and given what he did, you know, with all his statements on that issue, you know, on the criminalized women who, you know, who have abortions and punish them and that sort of thing. So he's not the right messenger, although they did modify the plank in the platform a little bit,

which was actually helpful, but it's not enough. Do you think the Republican Party can get back to a point where you could imagine, I mean, you have been in the past mentioned as a statewide candidate for governor or or Senate. Do you think the party can get to a point where someone like you who didn't vote for Trump and any of the elections that he ran in could run and win office? Well, I don't know. Look, parties change. All I know is that the Republican Party of Pennsylvania really was the party of Bill Scranton,

and senior. And out of that came people like Dick Thornburg and John Heinz and Tom R. and Mark Schweiker and Dick Schweiker, Hugh Scott. I mean, we had a lot of people who would win statewide, Arlen Specter. We had all these people who won statewide who, I could argue, were, you know, who really did reflect the state. And they were considered a bit more moderate, frankly, most of them, who did win statewide. And, you know, I, and again, we're not winning.

When Donald Trump says, hey, let's put up a guy like Doug Mastriano or, you know, who was wholly unfit and an absolutely horrific candidate by any measure, this was the guy. And you throw away an election. And then, and even Mehmet Maas, I mean, he's not a bad man. He's a smart guy. But he never lived in the state. And when, you know, the Republican establishment was going with McCormick, he was going with Oz. And you, and this, replicate that, not just in Pennsylvania, but Herschel Walker in Georgia. Didn't know how many kids he had. You know, there were, you know, spousal abuse issues that he admitted to. And you've got Mark Robinson in North Carolina, who apparently is a black Nazi, apparently, and just a wild candidate, but endorsed by Trump,

Tudor Dixon in Michigan, Kerry Lake in Arizona. I mean, how many times do we have to throw away winnable races in battleground states because of one man's utterly poor judgment in his candidate's election? I mean, that's where I get back to. I said, do we really want to win elections. If we wanted to win elections, we would never put up people like this. Speaking of the Senate, did you split tickets? Did you vote for McCormick? Or did you vote for Well, I am in my day job. I run the Aspen Institute congressional program. So I kind of try to stay out of congressional races as best I can. But I suspect a lot of Republicans are going who are dispirited, maybe voting Republicans straight down ballot. But I've been staying out

of legislative races just for that reason because of my day job. Let me close on this. It's election night tomorrow, Tuesday, when this is published. What piece of data will you be looking to as the polls close in Pennsylvania before they call the result in Pennsylvania that make you think it's going one way or the other? Where should viewers or listeners to this podcast look to? I am going to watch Northampton County. Watch those county results. And by the way, in 2020, they were pretty quick.

They had it all counted, I think, by Wednesday morning. And that's what I said, Biden's going to win Pennsylvania. And I said somewhere between 50 to 100,000 votes, and he was 81. And I also watch Erie County. But I do think North Hampton County is a better bellwether. I would also watch Bucks County, Pennsylvania. That's the most competitive of the four-collar counties. I think Biden won that by four or five points.

I'm curious to see if Harris does better there. She's going to need to do better there than Biden and the other collar counties, because I do think she needs to run up to score because I'm I think she could have a little bit of erosion in some other areas relative to Biden. So watch Northampton and Erie, Lackawanna, we're Scranton, this, and Bucks County. Those are the ones to watch. And hopefully we'll have relatively early returns from those counties. Yeah, let's hope so.

Charlie Dent, thank you for joining the Dispatch Podcast. Thank you, Jamie. Great to be with you. Thank you.