“ Little wonder that Casey is seen by Joe Biden as a friend and somewhat of a secret weapon: the president affectionately refers to Bob Casey Jr’s father as “Bob,” while he calls the currently serving Casey “Bobby”…
I occasionally wear my Bob Casey hat from his 2012 election.
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| I bought the hat during Senator Casey's 2012 Campaign. I picked up the poster (It's signed) at an SPLC meeting Ingrid Jones & me went to in Philadelphia |
“In the upscale Philadelphia suburb of Glenside last month, Senator Bob Casey turned on the charm at a campaign office opening.
A lesser-known, longtime veteran of the Senate, Casey’s pullover sweaters and nice-guy demeanor have earned him comparisons to another son of Pennsylvania — Mister Rogers — as well as the nickname “Mr Pennsylvania” by his state counterpart, Senator John Fetterman.
But beneath this folksy, Biden-esque persona is a steely operator who’s supposed to prove a critical asset to the president in the 2024 race.
A New York Times/Siena College poll showed Casey has a five-point lead in Pennsylvania against Republican Dave McCormick, a sign of Casey’s high name recognition and popularity. But that doesn’t mean he’s in for a smooth ride in November. Last month, a super PAC supporting his former hedge fund executive rival, Dave McCormick, dropped $4 million on an ad buy, and it plans to spend $30m for him overall. Republicans know the importance of knocking off Casey is that it would end the Democrats’ one-seat majority in the Senate. Much is at stake.
But Casey’s recent change of heart when it comes to his stance on abortion could be what shifts the needle. For a long time he remained one of the few anti-abortion Democrats in Congress. But he says the Supreme Court’s overturning Roe v Wade in 2022 changed his mind.
“If they can take a 49-year right away from women, they can take a right away from workers in the same court,” Casey said at a campaign speech in Glenside in May. He went on to promise that he plans to concentrate primarily on protecting women’s rights and voter rights…”
Abortion rights have become a lightning rod in this year’s election race, and if the midterms are anything to go by, a winning issue for Democrats. In Pennsylvania — a critical brick in the blue wall that Biden needs to win to regain the White House — 56 percent of voters think abortion should legal in either all or most cases.
Yet McCormick is anti-abortion except in very rare instances. Since the Dobbs case and its fallout, he has tried to pivot from a previously hardline stance. But in 2022, when he ran for Pennsylvania’s other Senate seat, he said, “I believe in the very rare instances [when abortion should be allowed], there should be exceptions for life of the mother.”
Now, his website says he “is opposed to a national abortion ban, and supports exceptions in the cases of rape, incest, and saving the life of the mother.” McCormick is a former official in the Treasury Department during George W Bush’s administration — but he is also married to Dina Powell, Trump’s former deputy national security adviser…
Exxon Mobil Corp. elected Dina Powell McCormick, a former adviser to President Donald Trump, to its board of directors.
Powell McCormick was one of the few Bush administration officials to win a role in the Trump administration, where she served as as deputy national security adviser until 2018. She spent 16 years at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. including as a member of the bank’s management committee, its top decision-making body.
FROM:
Exxon Elects Former Trump Adviser Dina Powell to Board
November 7, 2023 at 12:31 PM EST
Asked by The Independent what he thought of Casey’s change of heart on abortion, John Fetterman told The Independent that he believes his colleague is “firmly on the side of choice” and tried to paint McCormick as out of touch given the Republican hails from Connecticut.
“And of course, McCormick is against that,” Fetterman — who recently flipped a Republican seat in Pennsylvania largely due to female voter anger at the overturn of Roe v Wade — continued. The two go way back: When some voters feared Fetterman could not do the job after he suffered a stroke, Casey criss-crossed the state for Fetterman. And Casey’s low-key charm and family background balances out Fetterman’s more bolshy, hoodie-wearing personality nicely. Little wonder that Casey is seen by Joe Biden as a friend and somewhat of a secret weapon: the president affectionately refers to Bob Casey Jr’s father as “Bob,” while he calls the currently serving Casey “Bobby”.
The general consensus among Democrats is that winning a state in a post-Roe world now relies on putting the Fettermans of the world alongside the Caseys, and telling a story about reproductive rights that looks sensible and nuanced as opposed to highly ideological.
It helps, too, that Fetterman and Casey have strong roots in the counties they intend to represent.
“I am always going to be 100 percent supportive of my friend and ‘Mr Pennsylvania’,” Fetterman added. “Especially over that guy from Greenwich.”
MORE AT:
He used to be an anti-abortion Democrat. Now he’s Biden’s secret weapon
Planned Parenthood v Casey, a case that placed restrictions on abortion, bears his father’s name. Now, former pro-life Democrat Bob Casey has had a change of heart, Eric Garcia reports, and it could play a pivotal role in November’s election
June 9,2014
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