Pennsylvania Democrats, including Gov. Josh Shapiro, are pointing to a stunning upset in a special election for a deep-red state House district as proof that the party has momentum while campaigning this fall for a trifecta in Harrisburg.
Butler County Democrat Brandon Dukes said his apparent victory over Republican Scott Timko, by fewer than 100 votes as of Wednesday afternoon, was thanks to his focus on local issues, such as a major corridor perennially under construction to the frustration of residents.
“We kept it local, we kept it practical, and we kept it common sense,” Dukes said in an interview.
The 12th Pennsylvania House District, just north of Pittsburgh, went for President Donald Trump by more than 18 percentage points just two years ago and had been held by Republicans since 1999.
Dukes’ apparent win attracted national attention Wednesday as both a sign of the backlash to the president’s party heading into November and as a north star for centrist Democrats as they seek a path forward.
“We won that district last night with a middle-of-the-road community leader, who I backed, who won this improbable race,” Shapiro told CBS Mornings, contrasting Dukes with the party’s more left-leaning candidates this cycle.
“What we’re seeing are commonsense folk from the community who, I think, reflect a lot more my values and my approach to governing who are winning and are upsetting Republicans in these deeply Republican districts,” said Shapiro, a moderate Democrat widely expected to run for president in 2028.
Shapiro recorded a robocall urging voters to cast ballots in the race, his campaign confirmed.
Recipe for November
Democrats are aiming to flip four congressional districts in Pennsylvania this fall and win control of the state Senate for the first time in 30 years with Shapiro, a popular governor, at the top of the ticket.
Dukes, who will compete to win the seat again in November in a rematch with Timko, shattered previous Democratic runs in the Butler County district.
“The fact we just flipped this seat tonight is a political earthquake,” U.S. Rep. Brendan Boyle, a Philadelphia Democrat, said on X.
The district had been represented for more than two decades by one of the Pennsylvania House’s most conservative members, former State Rep. Daryl Metcalfe, who retired in 2023 and was known for his anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric and actions.
State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, a Philadelphia Democrat, said that the seat is one the party “should not have had a chance to come within sneezing distance of,” but that Dukes’ performance provides a blueprint that can be replicated throughout the state.
“Winning here means there is not a single safe seat for the GOP,” Kenyatta, a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee, said on X.
The Associated Press had not called the race as of Wednesday evening, but both parties made statements indicating that they expected Dukes’ lead to hold.
Chantell McCurdy, the director of Butler’s election bureau, said the initial count has been completed and there is a five-day period to challenge the results.
James Markley, a spokesperson the Pennsylvania Republican Party, said in a statement that the race needs to be a “wake up call for Republican voters,” and warned against policies from the Democratic Party’s more leftward flank.
While expressing confidence that the party would win the seat back in November, he also lamented the party’s inability to turn out voters this election.
“The General Election will come down to which party does a better job getting their voters to participate in the election using any legal means of casting a ballot. Democrats did a better job of this,” he said.
Voters in Pennsylvania have two methods of casting a ballot: voting in person or voting by mail. Trump has long railed against mail voting and promoted conspiracy theories around it. But Pennsylvania Republican officials have urged more use of the voting method in recent years, most notably in 2024, when Trump took the White House thanks in part to a higher rate of GOP mail voting.
Pennsylvania Republican House Leader Jesse Topper of Bedford County downplayed the significance of the special election, calling the results “disappointing but unsurprising” because of demographic change in the district, the timing of the vote during the summer, and the unpredictable electorate for such contests.
“There is much more yet to unfold in the final months of the 2026 election cycle and we will continue carrying out vision for positive growth in Pennsylvania through November,” he said.
But Democrats noted that Dukes’ victory in the district would not have been possible if he did not work to win over Republican voters.
“You cannot win a deep-red district like this without getting at least a big chunk of independents and at least some Republicans” who are “rejecting the chaos and high prices of Donald Trump,” said Pennsylvania Democratic chair Eugene DePasquale.
“I think this is a recipe for a big November for the Democratic Party,” he said.
Dukes, a loan administrator, said he listed affordability, infrastructure, and education as the key issues for his campaign.
DePasquale said Dukes’ campaign worked because he “focused on issues that mattered in the district,” such as high prices and cuts to Medicaid and food assistance under Trump.
But DePasquale dismissed the idea that Democrats should run only certain kinds of candidates to win.
“We need to be a big-tent party, and we need to have candidates that reflect their districts,” he said. “We are embracing candidates that spread the ideological spectrum of the Democratic coalition, and you’re going to see that lead to success this November.”
Statehouse campaigns often do not receive as much money or attention as congressional and statewide races, but Dukes received a boost from several major figures in the party.
In addition to Shapiro’s robocall, Dukes campaigned with Lt. Gov. Austin Davis and U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio of Western Pennsylvania.
He also boasted an endorsement from former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, another possible Democratic presidential contender, who said Wednesday that Dukes’ win “reflects voters’ readiness for change.”
Rematch ahead
After he is sworn in, Dukes will serve a roughly 2½-month term, following the resignation of former State Rep. Stephenie Scialabba, a Republican.
As an incumbent, he will then face a rematch with Timko in November for a full two-year term.
Dukes said he plans to “stick with what worked best” for his November campaign, which will include maintaining face-to-face contact with voters.
A graduate of the University of Pittsburgh, Dukes lives with his wife and daughter in Cranberry Township and describes himself as an “avid Star Wars fan” on his campaign website.
House Speaker Joanna McClinton, a Philadelphia Democrat, said Dukes’ win builds momentum for the party to make the case to voters about how electing Democrats achieves their goals on issues like codifying abortion protections and raising the minimum wage.
When state lawmakers return to Harrisburg in September, several issues await, including whether to tax and regulate skill games, finding a long-term funding solution to fund mass transit, and the use of cell phones in K-12 schools.
“When he gets started in Harrisburg in September, he’s going to be a part of the larger House Democratic agenda that’s been focused on affordability and on opportunities for all Pennsylvanians,” she said. “Voters were very motivated to make their values and their frustrations known at the ballot box.”
Dukes will provide votes that he can take back to constituents to further his reelection argument.
“It’s important to tell voters what you’re going to do to make their lives easier because that’s what we did, and we spoke about how we were going to do that,” he said. “It resonated pretty well last night.”
