Western Pennsylvania businessman Tom Wolf won the Democratic nomination for governor in a landslide Tuesday.
Wolf, the former secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue, captured 57.9 percent of the vote. He will face Republican Gov. Tom Corbett in the fall.
State Sen. Mike Stack (D-Fifth Dist.) will challenge incumbent Jim Cawley (R) this November for lieutenant governor.
In the gubernatorial race, Congresswoman Allyson Schwartz came in second with 17.6 percent of the vote, followed by state Treasurer Rob McCord with 16.9 percent and former secretary of Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Katie McGinty with 7.7 percent.
Wolf, an avid supporter of LGBT rights, told a crowd of supporters after the announcement that he felt “like the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”
“It’s time to give Pennsylvania a fresh start so we can focus on jobs, on education and on restoring William Penn’s founding principles of fairness and equality for all,” he continued.
Elsewhere in the state, Pennyslvania’s first openly gay Republican state legislator Mike Fleck (R-81st Dist.) may have been unseated by a write-in campaign. The final vote tally was not ready as of presstime.
Republican challenger Richard Irvin was ousted from the ballot due to his failure to file a financial-disclosure form, but he launched a write-in campaign. As of presstime, Fleck was about 300 votes behind.
Fellow openly gay state Rep. Brian Sims (D-182nd Dist.) received the nomination in his unopposed race.
Regarded as the most high-profile race in Pennsylvania, state Rep. Brendan Doyle won the Democratic nomination for the Congressional 13th District seat, vacated by Schwartz. Boyle captured 41 percent of the vote, followed by former Congresswoman Marjorie Margolies with 27 percent, state Sen. Daylin Leach (D-17th Dist.) with 17 percent and Val Arkoosh with 15.41 percent.
Boyle will face off against Republican challenger Dee Adcock.
In the Eighth Congressional District, Kevin Strouse won the nomination to challenge incumbent Congressman Mike Fitzpatrick, earning 51 percent of the votes against Shaughnessy Naughton.
State Sen. Christine Tartaglione (D-Second Dist.) defeated challenges by Tomas Sanchez and Danny Savage. Downingtown Mayor Josh Maxwell, who introduced and passed an LGBT nondiscrimination ordinance in Downingtown, beat openly gay Joshua Young for the Democratic nomination for the State House 74th District. Maxwell will challenge Republican Harry Lewis in the fall.
At the city level, state Rep. Ed Neilson defeated Republican Matt Wolfe and Libertarian Nikki Allen Poe in the special election for City Council. Neilson will fill the at-large seat vacated by Bill Green.
