During his six full terms representing Delaware in the U.S. Senate, Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, was often regarded as Pennsylvania’s third U.S. senator. A native son of the Keystone State, Biden spent his early childhood in Scranton. That background, conventional wisdom holds, makes him a formidable candidate in Pennsylvania against President Trump, who carried the state by less than one percentage point in 2016.
Scranton, however, is a poor gauge of Pennsylvania’s electoral mood. Scrantonians maintain a tribal allegiance to the Democratic Party, but their city’s insular politics no longer reflect other parts of Lackawanna County or even the surrounding region. Northeastern Pennsylvania increasingly trends Republican. Its working-class voters -- especially in populous Luzerne County, immediately south of Scranton -- ensured Trump’s state victory in 2016. They no longer believe that Democrats represent their social and economic interests.
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