For Pennsylvania Democrats, the bad news during the past year hasn't just been that they lost every statewide election in 2024. It's that they've been losing a lot of the voters themselves: The party is in danger of surrendering an advantage in voter registrations it has enjoyed in the state since the 1970s. And if there's a silver lining, it may lie in the rise of voters who are sick of both parties.
"We've gotta do a better job on voter registration," said Eugene DePasquale, a former auditor general who appears poised to become the next chair of the state Democratic Party. "The Republicans have been making inroads there, and there's no sugarcoating it. We've gotta get better, end of story."
Five years ago, Democrats in the state held an edge of more than 800,000 voters over Republicans. As of this month, that margin had shrunk to slightly more than 175,000, with Democrats holding 3.8 million voters to the GOP's 3.6 million. And that number includes "inactive" voters who haven't voted in the past two federal election cycles: Among active voters, the gap is just 53,000 people.
A key factor driving those numbers: State data shows that from 2008 to 2024, more than 700,000 Democrats switched their registration to Republican. Just under 400,000 Republicans crossed party lines in the other direction.
To some extent, the trend reflects a longstanding change seen in many areas outlying Pittsburgh, where more conservative Democrats have changed their party label to align with the fact that they'd been voting for Republicans anyway. But as margins have evaporated, politicos have begun raising alarms about "a stampede" from the Democratic Party, not only in Pennsylvania, but in other battlegrounds such as Nevada and Arizona.
The problem is summed up in Erie County, a one-time Democratic bastion that is often considered a bellwether for the state and the nation. As of earlier this month, Republicans were less than 6,000 voters away from achieving an outright majority there. In 2020, Democrats had a more than 24,000-voter advantage.
That shift should alarm state Dems, said Scott Presler, a conservative activist whose group Early Vote Action registers Republicans.
"The fact that Erie continues to trend to the right really should have the Democrat Party shaking in their boots," said Presler, who gained online notoriety as an influencer denying the results of Joe Biden's 2020 election win.
Republicans hope to build on that momentum.
C.J. Parker, the state Republican Party's political director, said the GOP has offered local party committees some added incentive to turn the state red by the end of 2025.
"We launched a friendly voter-registration competition amongst all 67 county parties … to boost the energy and push across the finish line, because we want to flip the state for active registrations to Republican by the end of the year," Parker said.
Parker said the state party will pay cash bonuses to county committees for voter registration work "based on historical trends and sheer population." While he declined to provide a dollar amount for the incentives, he said county groups can spend the money on "whatever they deem necessary" to support efforts in their communities.
Berwood Yost, director of Franklin & Marshall College's Center for Opinion Research, said Republicans had clearly embraced successful organizing strategies, while Democrats are "well behind the times."
DePasquale acknowledged Democrats have work to do, saying the party needs to be "more aggressive" in its efforts.
"I don't mean tackling people and stuff, "he said. "I'm just saying, do what Republicans are doing right now: … You can incentivize your county parties to do that, to go out there and be more aggressive and register people."
Blue state blues
Some Democrats say voter-registration numbers tell only part of the story.
"[Republicans] are just trying to run up numbers. They're not having consistent, sustained conversations. They sign 'em up and move on," said Mitch Kates, executive director of the Pa. Democratic Party.
By contrast, Kates said, signing up new Democratic voters isn't just "transactional — it's cause-related and folks are stepping up for the cause."
Both nationally and in Pennsylvania, there is evidence to suggest that Democrats are becoming more likely than Republicans to turn out even for low-wattage races. This past spring, for example, Democrat James Malone won a state Senate special election in a district that hadn't been represented by a Democrat for more than a century.
As for the broader registration trend, Democrats say a big hurdle is the money arrayed against them.
"We have no Jeffrey Yass," said Margie Swoboda, chair of the Centre County Democratic Committee, referencing the state's richest man and a top supporter of conservative causes. "The Democrats don't have those kinds of funding [sources], but we depend on our foot soldiers to make sure they get out and knock on doors and make sure people understand what's at stake."
Presler, for his part, acknowledges drawing support from even deeper pockets than Yass: Last year, his organization received a $1 million donation from Elon Musk, the world's wealthiest man. (Though Presler did tell WESA that since Musk's high-profile falling out with President Donald Trump, he has not promised the registration effort any more funds — and has unfollowed Presler on social media.)
Republican groups like Presler's have hired hourly workers to sign up new voters at events, including county fairs, while Democrats like Swoboda say they've continued to rely on their stable of volunteers.
Centre County lost some Democrats in part to voter roll maintenance, Swoboda said. Barack Obama's campaign registered more than 16,000 Democrats to vote in the county between 2008 to 2012, but many of them either moved after finishing school at PSU or became inactive.
"So we are starting to see a lot of those voters come off of those [voter] rolls," Swoboda said.
Republicans also have seen waves and troughs following the presidential election cycle. But the trend in Centre County has favored them: While the parties were in a near dead-heat last year, state data shows Republicans now leading the state by 817 voters.
It's not clear that trend will continue, as polls suggest voters are having second thoughts about Donald Trump less than a year into his term.
"Historically as you enter a midterm election, when your party has elected a president, the sledding gets tougher," said Chris Borick, a political science professor and director of Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion. "A lot of the Republican gains came during the Biden years, and we'll see if that momentum can carry over."
With Trump's approval ratings in the low 40s, Borick added, "That might start to bleed into efforts to register voters."
Then again, he noted, "Democrats have their own brand problem."
Last month, a poll showed that only 33% of voters held a favorable view of the Democratic Party. And observers say Democrats have made their own serious miscalculations, in particular when it comes to gauging the support of historically left-leaning demographics — such as Latino, Black, or young voters.
Democrats came to believe that "just expanding the portion of the electorate that was made up of people belonging to these demographic groups was predictably gonna work in Democrats' favor," said Lara Putnam, a history professor at the University of Pittsburgh who tracks grassroots political movements.
But " 2024 really solidified evidence that demography is not destiny in that way," she added, as Trump made gains for Republicans in many demographic groups, especially with Latino men.
Independents' day
Regardless of their diverging registration trends, Democrats and Republicans do have one worry in common: The state has been witnessing a rise in the number of voters who prefer not to identify with either major party.
Yost, of Franklin & Marshall, noted that the number of independent voters has grown steadily during the past 20 years by 46% — from about 976,000 to more than 1.4 million.
"That's where the greatest growth has happened… and I think that's because people are generally dissatisfied with the state of our politics," Yost said.
"It's those independents, or unaffiliated voters, that ultimately are gonna decide the election," he added. "The evidence right now suggests that neither party has built a sustainable kind of policy… [or] agenda that has led a whole bunch of voters to move their way and stick with them."
Some of the factors driving the rise in independent voters may have little to do with current political debates.
Putnam said one recent reason for the rise in independent registration is the establishment of automatic voter registration, like the policy implemented in 2023 at Pennsylvania drivers' license centers. Democrats such as Governor Josh Shapiro espoused increased ballot access, while Republicans suspected a Democratic ploy to stack the deck. But when voters register at such centers, they are likely to reject both parties.
"We're talking about the people who would not otherwise have gotten registered," Putnam added. "So we shouldn't be surprised that more people are registering as independents."
Such registrations also take place outside the kind of broader political discussion that Democratic strategist Aleigha Cavalier used to encourage. When registering young voters for the nonprofit NextGen America in 2018, she said, "We were saying, 'Do you care about abortion? Do you care about climate? Do you care about economic or racial justice?'"
But the economy has become less predictable and young people aren't as certain about their futures now, she said. In such a climate, "Leading with issues is not enough."
"We're asking them to pick a political party, and a lot of folks view that as kind of absurd," Cavalier added. "Like their house is burning down and you're asking them to pick what color sofa they want."
Chris Potter contributed to this story.
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