Mercer County, Pennsylvania is a vibrant and diverse county located in the northwestern region of the state. It has a rich political history and a number of local political candidates vying for office every election cycle. While the names of the current political candidates may change depending on the election season, Mercer County residents take an active role in local politics by electing their representatives to their respective offices. As such, locals take an interest in the various issues that affect their county such as economic development, infrastructure maintenance, public safety, and social programs. Locals often rally around these issues when voting for elected officials who will take action to address them. Given its strong sense of community and dedication to engaging with politics at both a regional and national level, Mercer County continues to be an important player in Pennsylvania's political landscape.
The political climate in Mercer County, PA is strongly conservative.
In Mercer County, PA 36.2% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 62.2% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.6% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Mercer county remained overwhelmingly Republican, 62.2% to 36.2%.
Mercer county voted Republican in the last five Presidential elections, after voting Democratic in 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Mercer County, PA is strongly conservative.
Youngstown-Warren-Boardman Metro Area is somewhat conservative.
Pennsylvania is leaning liberal.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index is based on recent voting in national elections, federal campaign contributions by local residents, and consumer personality profiles.
VoteWord™
Displaying 20 years of Presidential voting, visualized in one word.
Mercer, Pennsylvania: d r r r R R
How It Works:
Here at BestPlaces, we were looking at the voting patterns since the 2000 election and realized that we could express the results of each election as one letter. R if the Republican Party candidate won, D for the Democrat and I for the Independent. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D R R).
Then we went a little further and added the dimension of magnitude. If the difference of victory was greater than 10 percent, the letter is upper case, and lower case if the difference was less than 10 percent. This allows us to see interesting voting patterns at just a glance.
Here's the VoteWord for Iowa d r d d r. In the last six elections the state has been closely contested, voting narrowly for the Republican Party candidate in 2016 and 2020 after voting for the Democratic Party in 2008 and 2012. Virginia (r r d d d D) has voted for the Democratic Party in the last three elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in Mercer County, PA
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 1,538 contributions totaling $104,086 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $68 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 1,002 contributions totaling $196,138 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $196 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)