HARRISBURG — Democrats have picked up a Pennsylvania Senate seat in a district that strongly supported Donald Trump, an unexpected victory that party leaders painted as a rebuke to the Republican president.
James Malone, mayor of East Petersburg in Lancaster County, defeated Commissioner Josh Parsons by 482 votes, unofficial results show. The Associated Press called the race Wednesday afternoon.
"Obviously we are disappointed in the numbers,” Parsons posted on social media late Tuesday. “We are still reviewing them, but it appears we will come up a little short."
Malone’s win does not affect control of the state Senate, but means Republicans’ edge in the upper chamber will be 27-23 after he’s sworn in.
Also this week, Democrat Dan Goughnour easily won a separate special election for an Allegheny County state House seat. His win means Democrats will retain control of the narrowly divided lower chamber.
The Pennsylvania Senate Democratic Campaign Committee and party leaders like Gov. Josh Shapiro called Malone’s victory a rejection of Trump’s second-term agenda.
“This is a referendum on the chaos Washington Republicans have brought to our state and the silence and inaction Harrisburg Republicans have responded with,” state Sen. Vincent Hughes (D., Philadelphia), who chairs the caucus’ campaign arm, said in a statement. “Voters are fed up, and they showed up tonight in Lancaster.”
Malone was considered a longshot. The 36th Senate District, which includes small towns, farmland, and burgeoning exurbs, backed Trump by 15 percentage points in November. It has not elected a Democrat since being moved to south-central Pennsylvania via redistricting in the 1980s.
The region’s voters, however, have increasingly supported Democrats in statewide elections since the first Trump administration.
The race also received little attention or money at first, said Stella Sexton, vice chair of the Lancaster County Democratic Committee and a co-campaign manager for Malone.
That changed in the final two weeks. Campaign finance reports show a flood of dollars to both candidates from a mix of in and out-of-state donors in that period. The race even got a shoutout from tech billionaire and Trump advisor Elon Musk, who used social media to warn that Republicans could lose the race.
Parsons, a vocal conservative and Trump ally who notably feuded with the county’s newspaper, focused his campaign on his time as commissioner. He touted accomplishments including keeping taxes low, opposition to mail voting and COVID-19 lockdowns, and fighting local libraries over drag queen visits.
Malone’s website says he supports public education, housing policies including helping first-time home buyers, and “lowering the cost of everyday essentials.” Sexton said the campaign deliberately focused on the same sort of issues that helped state House Democrats keep their one-vote majority in the lower chamber in November.
“Some of whatever makes people vote for Donald Trump doesn't translate to anybody who isn't Donald Trump,” Sexton said.
That — plus Malone’s easygoing, everyman personality — helped seal the race, she argued.
“Lancaster County is worth investing in,” Sexton added. “It is not a safe Republican area anymore.”
A spokesperson for state Senate Republicans’ campaign arm argued that the result does “not accurately reflect the challenges Democrats face.”
“While this special election doesn't alter the reality that voters in the 2024 general election opted to retain a Republican State Senate as a firewall to Governor Shapiro's progressive agenda, it is clear that defeating Democrats in this election cycle will require significant resources,” spokesperson Michael Straw said.
He pointed to a $100,000 donation to Malone from a Chicago-based liberal political group.
In a fundraising email Wednesday, Pennsylvania activist Cliff Maloney blamed Republicans for failing to push mail ballots or engage grassroots supporters. Maloney founded the door-knocking operation Pennsylvania Chase and made headlines last year for “falsely” accusing nuns in Erie of voter fraud.
"This special election proves that if we do not CONSTANTLY fight the Dems at mail-in votes… we will lose," the email said.
The seat was vacated by state Sen. Ryan Aument, who resigned in December to take a job with U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick (R., Pa.).
The state House district that was up for election includes some small mill towns along the Monongahela River south of Pittsburgh, and has been represented by Democrats for the past 60 years.
When Goughnour is sworn in, Democrats will again lead the chamber by a margin of just 102 to 101. That will give Democrats additional leverage in upcoming budget talks, as well as the power to decide what bills get a vote and which languish on the table.
The Allegheny County seat was vacant after the sudden death of Democratic state Rep. Matt Gergely in January due to complications from a health emergency late last year.
In Gergely’s place, the district’s voters picked Goughnour, a retired police officer and local school board member, over Republican Chuck Davis, a fire chief and local township councilor. Unofficial results show Goughnour with 63% of the vote.
Both chambers were in session this week as lawmaking restarted following weeks of budget hearings. Bills that would mandate paid family leave and restrict sports eligibility for transgender girls and women are among the proposals being considered.
While a similar vacancy in the state House in the first months of the previous session led to an acrimonious partisan battle, this one hasn’t resulted in power struggles or ground action in the Capitol to a halt.
Lawmakers have shown similar signs of compromise when it comes to policy. Shapiro has already signed two laws since the start of 2025; it took him until May 2023 to sign his first law in the session that began that year.
