Republican Senate candidate David McCormick has ousted longtime Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey, according to an Associated Press projection.
McCormick, an Army combat veteran and former hedge fund CEO, led Casey 48.9 percent of the vote to 48.5 percent of the vote, with 99 percent of the vote counted.
With less than 32,000 votes separating the candidates, Casey declined to concede after the AP race call on Thursday.
“This race is within half a point and cannot be called while the votes of thousands of Pennsylvanians are still being counted,” Casey campaign spokeswoman Maddy McDaniel said in a statement. “We will make sure every Pennsylvanian’s voice is heard.”
The race could be subject to an automatic recount if a candidate’s margin of victory is no more than 0.5 percent of total votes cast.
The AP projection came after McCormick’s team had expressed confidence in a win earlier in the day.
“McCormick is up 30,679 votes with more to come, as ruby red Cambria County is still outstanding. While votes continue to be counted, any way you slice it, Dave McCormick will be the next United States Senator from Pennsylvania,” said McCormick’s communications director, Elizabeth Gregory.
However, the campaign of the three-term senator insisted Casey still had a path to victory.
“The count in Pennsylvania is still continuing,” McDaniel said earlier on Thursday. “Yesterday, the vote margin shrunk by 50,000 votes and this race is now within half a point, the threshold for automatic recounts in Pennsylvania. With tens of thousands more votes to be counted, we are committed to ensuring every Pennsylvanian’s vote is heard and confident that at the end of that process, Senator Casey will be re-elected.”
The Pennsylvania seat is the fourth Republicans were able to flip this cycle and adds to the party’s Senate majority, which currently stands at 53-45, with two race calls outstanding in Arizona and Nevada — though Democrats currently lead in both of those races.
Casey’s loss marks the end of a Pennsylvania political dynasty that first began with his father, the late Pennsylvania governor Bob Casey Sr.
Heading into Election Day, the Cook Political Report had rated the race a “toss-up.” It was the second-most expensive contest of the 2024 campaign cycle, with $344 million spent on ad buys.
McCormick was one of several Senate candidates who sought to tie their Democratic opponents to President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
In a clip from one McCormick campaign ad, Casey could be heard saying: “Kamala Harris is inspiring and very capable, the more people get to know her they’re going to be particularly impressed by her ability.”
The ad blasted Harris for her calls during the 2020 Democratic presidential primary to ban fracking, eliminate the filibuster, abolish ICE, defund the police, and decriminalize illegal immigration. However, Harris’s campaign had walked back some of these positions. After former president Donald Trump brought up Harris’s 2019 comments on banning fracking, her campaign dismissed them as “false claims” and defended the Biden-Harris administration’s energy record, claiming America now has the highest-ever domestic energy production.
The RNC celebrated McCormick’s win in a statement on Thursday. “As a combat veteran, business leader, and national security expert, the Senator-elect will make a great advocate for Americans in the Keystone State and partner for President Trump to Make America Great Again,” RNC chairman Michael Whatley said.