27 days until Election Day, State Navigate’s polling shows Independent Jodi Borello tied with incumbent Republican Camera Bartolotta
The most shocking poll of the cycle is not in Texas, Iowa, Kansas, or any other red state. It’s in Vermont.
Three US Senate races in reliably Republican states this year feature an Independent supported by Democrats running as the lone opposition against a Republican: Nebraska, South Dakota, Idaho. It’s part of a new strategy Democrats have pursued since Evan McMullin’s 2022 run for US Senate in Utah, where they choose not to nominate a candidate and instead back an Independent with crossover appeal in more conservative territory where the “D” next to someone’s name on the ballot can be an electoral death sentence.
Democrats have used this strategy on the state legislative level since at least the 2010s, particularly in the states of Maine, Alaska, Utah, South Dakota, and Nebraska (which is continuing in these states this year), but it’s becoming a new occurrence in other states including Alabama, Wisconsin, Kansas, and Pennsylvania. In recent weeks, some of State Navigate’s contacts in Appalachia flagged one of these districts to us: Pennsylvania State Senate District 46, suggesting that our forecast projecting a nearly 20-point win for the Republican incumbent was far off from what both sides of the aisle are seeing.
PA SD-46 is located in “ancestrally Democratic” Southwestern Pennsylvania, containing all of Washington and Greene counties, plus part of Beaver County. The last time a Democrat represented this part of Pennsylvania at the state legislative level was State Representative Pam Snyder (D-Greene), who won re-election in 2020 but decided to retire in 2022. In 2018, Conor Lamb (D) also briefly represented this part of Pennsylvania after winning a special election in March of that year, largely thanks to his performance in Allegheny County.
In January of this year, the Washington County Republican Executive Committee passed a vote of no confidence in Bartolotta, which the state party declared void. The vote of no confidence listed grievances including her support for mail-in ballots, defending Haitian immigrants, and working to unseat Republican incumbents. In the May 19th Republican primary, incumbent Republican Camera Bartolotta faced stiff competition from her right in challenger Albert Buchtan in what locals have described as a “brutal” contest, but won by 7 points. A month later, the Democratic candidate withdrew, leaving Independent Jodi Borello as the lone challenger to Bartolotta after securing enough signatures to appear on the November ballot.
Borello is much more unique of a candidate than someone like Dan Osborn in Nebraska, though: her television ads identify her as a “previous Trump voter”; Borello was a registered Republican up until several months ago. A state moratorium on data centers, anti-big corporation rhetoric, and clean water have been the focal points of her campaigns. Borello, who worked at an environmental advocacy group, has been attacked by Bartolotta in ads for her previous work.
State Navigate conducted a live poll of the race last week, showing a dead-even race. Our final poll shows the same result: Bartolotta and Borello are tied, 43% – 43% with 14% of voters undecided. Before pushing leaners, Bartolotta holds a 3-point lead, 40% – 37%. Bartolotta holds some support amongst Democrats in the district, but Borello is pulling many more conservatives from Bartolotta’s voting base. This is truly one of the strangest state legislative elections in the country as it currently stands, but that remains to be seen if current voting intention patterns hold as Republicans are going on the airwaves painting Borello as a liberal. As it stands, our forecast sees Bartolotta as a slight favorite in the race now, though our poll’s undecided voters seem to be favorable for Borello.
You can check the full results for each poll below.