Pennsylvania 2020 Election Results

Pennsylvania held its general election on November 3, 2020, deciding 228 legislative seats and 3 statewide offices. No chamber changed party control.

Highlights

• House Democrats, who had hoped to retake the majority for the first time in a decade, instead lost ground: Republicans widened their House edge from 110-93 to 113-90 and kept their Senate majority heading into post-2020-census redistricting. Republicans also won two of the three statewide offices on the ballot.
• The night's biggest legislative loss was House Democratic Leader Frank Dermody (D), who lost suburban Pittsburgh's District 33 to Carrie DelRosso (R) by fewer than 900 votes and conceded the race. Democrats' lone House pickup was Republican Rep. Thomas Murt's open seat in District 152, where Nancy Guenst (D) won by about 9 points. Republicans flipped three more Democratic seats:
  • Rep. Wendy Ullman (D) lost District 143 in the Philadelphia suburbs to Shelby Labs (R) by about 3 points.
  • Rep. Joseph Petrarca (D) lost District 55 to Jason Silvis (R) by about 5 points.
  • Tim Twardzik (R) won the open District 123 seat of retiring Rep. Neal Goodman, a Democrat, by about 25 points.
• The state Senate's closest race became its fiercest fight. Sen. Jim Brewster (D) held Senate District 45 by 69 votes over Nicole Ziccarelli (R) after counting undated mail ballots that Ziccarelli sued to throw out. When the new Senate convened in January 2021, Republican leaders refused to seat Brewster in a chaotic session that briefly removed Lt. Gov. John Fetterman as presiding officer. A federal judge ruled for Brewster a week later, Ziccarelli dropped her challenge, and Senate leaders agreed to seat him.
• The Senate otherwise traded one seat each way. John Kane (D), a plumbers' union leader, unseated Sen. Tom Killion (R) in Senate District 9 by about 4 points and, by his own account, became the first Democrat to hold the seat in nearly 150 years. Devlin Robinson (R) defeated Sen. Pam Iovino (D) by about 4 points in Senate District 37.
• Treasurer Joe Torsella (D) lost re-election by less than 1 point to Stacy Garrity (R), a retired Army Reserve colonel who said she was outspent 10 to 1. Timothy DeFoor (R), the Dauphin County controller, won the open auditor general's office by about 3 points over Nina Ahmad (D), becoming the first person of color elected to a Pennsylvania row office. Attorney General Josh Shapiro (D) won re-election by about 5 points over Heather Heidelbaugh (R).
• In all, 6 incumbents lost. Beyond the flips and Brewster's race, three House races finished within 2 points: Rep. Christina Sappey (D) held District 158 by about 500 votes, Craig Williams (R) kept the open District 160 Republican by about 600, and Rep. Christopher Quinn (R) held District 168 by fewer than 900. Another 74 legislative races had only one candidate on the ballot.

Legislature

• House (203 seats): 91 D, 110 R, 2 other or vacant before the election, 90 D, 113 R after; control stayed with Republicans.
• Senate (50 seats): 22 D, 28 R before the election, 21 D, 29 R after; control stayed with Republicans.

Statewide races

Legislative races