Schwartz Maintains Lead in Pennsylvania; Katie McGinty Coming on Strong

Coming on strong, McGinty leads in three of the state’s five regions and is tied in a fourth region.

U.S. Rep. Allyson Schwartz has maintained her lead in the crowded field for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in Pennsylvania, according to poll released yesterday by Harper Polling.

Running strongest in southeast Pennsylvania, the five-term congresswoman from Montgomery County is favored by 22% of the commonwealth’s Democrats.

Kathleen McGinty, a former secretary of the state Department of Environmental Protection, ran second in the poll, garnering 15% of the vote in a hypothetical six-way primary.  McGinty, who was born and raised in northeast Philadelphia and now resides in Chester County, holds narrow leads in three of the state’s five regions and is tied in a fourth.

State Treasurer Rob McCord was third in the survey of 649 likely Democratic primary voters with 12%, followed by former Department of Environmental Protection Secretary and one-time PUC Commissioner John Hanger at 7 percent.

Allentown Mayor Ed Pawlowski, who captured both major-party nominations before surviving a spirited challenge from former city councilman and independent candidate W. Michael Donovan to win a third term as mayor of the state’s third-largest city earlier this month, was fifth in the Harper survey with 6 percent, placing him slightly ahead of former state Secretary of Revenue Tom Wolf, a wealthy York businessman.

Thirty-four percent of those polled are undecided.

The names of two other declared Democratic candidates — Lebanon County Commissioner Jo Ellen Litz and little-known Mechanicsburg minister Max Myers — weren’t included in the poll.  Nor was former two-term state Auditor General Jack Wagner of Pittsburgh, who is reportedly weighing another candidacy for governor after losing the party’s nomination in 2010 and failing in a mayoral bid this past spring.

Wagner, 65, said that he will make a decision regarding the race in December.

The Democratic nominee is expected to face beleaguered Republican Gov. Tom Corbett in next year’s general election.