'It’s a mistake!' Republicans fear Trump strategy risks throwing away huge election prize

Pennsylvania is the presidential election's biggest prize among battleground states with 19 electoral votes, and blue-collar Erie County will most likely play a crucial role in choosing the winner.

The county has voted with the winning presidential candidate in the last four elections – Joe Biden eked out a 1,500-vote win in 2020 while Donald Trump beat Hillary Clinton by fewer than 2,000 votes in 2016 – and both campaigns are focused on turning out the 177,000 registered voters there — but in strikingly different ways, reported Reuters.

"Trump and his team appear to be banking on the power of his personal pull," said Chris Borick, a pollster and political science professor at Pennsylvania's Muhlenberg College. "[Kamala] Harris and the Democrats are investing deeply in a more traditional ground game here and thus this election will be a test of dramatically different strategies."

The Harris campaign and the Democratic Party opened three offices in Erie County with eight paid staffers along with more than 300 volunteers, including 60-year-old Marie Troyer, a retired teacher who's answering phones and managing volunteers.

"It's the bellwether part of it," Troyer said. "It's the mere fact that this particular city, in this particular state, could ultimately decide who's president and they know it."

The Harris campaign is building a formidable ground-game operation using its cash advantage – $361 million raised in August compared to Trump's $130 million – to mobilize supporters and identify new voters, but the former president's campaign is gambling on driving out infrequent voters and a voter registration drive that has cut into Democrats' traditional advantage.

"I've been pretty bombarded with mail, phone calls and texts," said Erin Miller, a 38-year-old bartender and mother of six who recently moved from Colorado but never voted in a presidential election – which makes her a prime target for both campaigns.

Door-to-door canvassing for Trump's campaign has been managed by America PAC, an outside groups primarily funded by billionaire Elon Musk, and local Democratic campaign consultant Mike Mikus said the difference between that operation and Harris' has been striking.

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“I’ve yet to see a Republican,” Mikus told Politics Dispatch. “I may have missed them. I might not have been home when they were there.”

Erie County Democratic Party chairman Sam Talarico said there was visually less activity at the joint campaign office for Trump and the county's Republican Party, and he said his canvassers rarely encounter the rival campaign.

“I did talk to our canvassers yesterday," Talarico said, "and they said this weekend was the first time they saw, you know, literature from the Trump campaign."

The Republican National Committee has shifted resources away from turnout to preparations for legal challenges to fight claims of "election integrity," and a recent decision by the Federal Election Commission allows campaigns to coordinate with super PACs and other outside groups to boost turnout, which the Trump campaign has done to the dismay of many Republicans.

“It’s a mistake, okay?” said one Pittsburgh-area GOP operative. “These people are veterans, they’re good at what they do. Republicans, we don’t take care of our folks. You know, we’re relying on volunteers every single election. You’ve got to rebuild coalitions every single election.”

Democrats are relaying on their battle-tested coalition of unions, civic groups and Black churches to turn out voters, but the Harris campaign has had trouble mobilizing some Black voters, especially men, and some locals say the energy isn't as high for the vice president as it was for Joe Biden or Barack Obama.

"It's just not that intense," said 51-year-old Monty Davis, who runs a local youth program and plans to vote for Harris.

But some Black voters in razor-thin Erie County say they're backing Trump.

"We don't care about LBGT rights," said Howard Pratchett, a 48-year-old barber who finds Trump more "factual" than Harris. "We don't care about, you know, abortion rights. We're not worried about that. They don't offer anything to the straight Black male voters."