Doug Mastriano

The 2022 midterm elections consumed more than 16.5 billion real American dollars. They featured thousands of candidates and the most expensive Senate race in history, resulting in the election of Democrat John Fetterman from Pennsylvania. Millions of viewers across the country tuned in to watch election-night returns in anticipation of a promised red wave that never came. The 2022 midterms were the political equivalent of the Red Queen’s race — a massive effort, all to end up pretty much back where you started. Post-election recriminations were complicated by how well Republicans actually did. They massively increased their turnout and won the House of Representatives. They saw wide margins of victory by incumbent governors in Florida, Georgia, Ohio and Texas.

Pittsburgh Fresh off the campaign stage in Arizona, where he stumped for gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake, Florida governor Ron DeSantis made his way to Pittsburgh for another Turning Point Action rally. This one was supposedly for Doug Mastriano (DeSantis was headed to Ohio for J.D. Vance right afterward), who’s challenging state attorney general Josh Shapiro to replace Democratic governor Tom Wolf — but his address sounded every word a DeSantis 2024 presidential speech. The polls suggest Mastriano needs all the help he can get, as Shapiro — who has already spent $12 million on ads — leads Mastriano — running a “shoestring campaign” — by a healthy margin (one recent poll has Shapiro leading by fifteen points). But DeSantis hardly mentioned Mastriano at all.