Mimi McCann ’13, Amanda Paolino ’15, Isabella Sanchez ’16: As the November presidential election approaches, candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney are refocusing their campaigns on swing states, such as Pennsylvania, which ultimately determine the outcome of the election.
Once a major battleground state, Pennsylvania has been shifting more and more in favor of Obama in recent months. A poll conducted by the Philadelphia Inquirer maintains that Obama holds an eleven-point lead in Pennsylvania as of now. Chair of Radnor Township Democratic Committee, George Badey, remarked, “Obama currently has the lead, but anything can happen in a month.”
Ed Rendell, former governor of Pennsylvania, informed Pennsylvania at the 2012 Democratic National Convention that the Republican Party could decide to begin spending heavily closer to Election Day, saying, “We are going to be outspent. All of a sudden that nine point lead becomes a six point lead becomes a three point lead.”
Recognizing the crucial nature of the swing states, both sides of the campaign have spent unprecedented sums of money on television advertisements in swing states. According to the Huffington Post, the Obama campaign has spent nearly $125 million on TV ads thus far, $113 million of which have gone toward ads broadcasted in the nine swing states of Colorado, Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Florida.
Though the Romney campaign has only spent roughly $45 million on TV advertising, the campaign receives contributions from independent conservative groups that when added to the campaign finances surpass the amount Obama has spent by tens of millions of dollars.
According to Mitt Romney, Pennsylvania still has time to swing to the right. However, it appears that President Obama has made a greater effort than Romney to try to swing the state of Pennsylvania to the left.
In a speech delivered at Valley Forge Military Academy on September 28, Romney stated, “We really would shock people if early in the evening on Nov. 6th it looked like Pennsylvania was going to come our way,” but also that “it could happen.” Romney said, “The Obama campaign thinks Pennsylvania is in their pocket, they don’t need to worry about it. And you’re right and they’re wrong — we’re going to win Pennsylvania.”
It comes down to specific counties in determining the outcome of any state election. Episcopal voters and families residing in Montgomery County in particular are very important to the Pennsylvania election. With the second largest republican population of any county in the state, Montgomery County plays a crucial role in determining the outcome of the Pennsylvania election. Brian Williams of NBC mentioned Montgomery County as one of the most important swing counties when he appeared on The Daily Show. Rohan Gulati ‘13, Co-President of the Young Democrats Club, who had the opportunity to work as a fellow at an Obama office in Montgomery county this past summer explained that Pennsylvania Democrats are working hard through “phone banks, canvassing and voter registration in order to secure more Democratic votes.”
As of now, Pennsylvania’s outcome for the election, although seemingly already decided, has the ability to change at any moment, proving the Keystone state to truly be key to this election.

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