The Other McCain

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HUGE: Challenger O’Connor Defeats BLM Pittsburgh Mayor in Democratic Primary

Posted on | May 21, 2025 | No Comments

Generally speaking, I’m against “common sense” Democrats. As a conservative, I want to see the Democratic Party destroy itself by embracing the most extreme ideas of the progressive fringe. From that perspective, Corey O’Connor’s victory in Tuesday’s Democratic primary for mayor of Pittsburgh is actually bad news, because the guy he was running against, incumbent Mayor Ed Gainey, is the pluperfect example of everything wrong with the Democratic Party. Gainey “has been a vocal supporter of the Black Lives Matter movement” and, when he was a member of the Pennsylvania state legislature in 2020, he joined a “protest on the floor of the state House to demand a special session on police reform.” Democrats want to be the party of cop-hating racial demagoguery? As a Republican, I say, “Go for it!”

Likewise with Gainey’s embrace of “affordable housing” mandates. Understand that I am not against affordable housing. The problem is the use of mandates and regulations to impose so-called “affordable housing” in places that contradict actual market conditions. These policies do more harm than good. Common sense would suggest that, if you can’t afford to live where you want to live, maybe consider moving someplace cheaper, but the advocates of “affordable housing” mandates apparently imagine there is a right to live wherever you want, and therefore impose mandates that are essentially futile attempts at price-fixing.

Gainey’s election as Pittsburgh mayor in 2021 was hailed as a “progressive” victory, but now that’s all come crashing down:

Allegheny County Controller Corey O’Connor defeated Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey in the city’s hotly contested Democratic mayoral primary, The Associated Press projected Tuesday, after a race which garnered national attention as a notable proxy fight between progressives and center-left Democrats.
With more than 85% of the vote in, O’Connor led Gainey 54%-46% in the nominating contest.
Tuesday’s election was one of the first major Democratic primaries since the 2024 election in which the party’s progressive and center-left wings faced off. And the mayoral race followed an election cycle where Democratic governance of cities took center-stage in Republican campaign messaging.
Gainey and his allies painted O’Connor, the county controller and the son of a former mayor, as beholden to President Donald Trump and monied real estate interests, pointing to campaign donations from Trump backers and developers. . . .
Gainey, the city’s first Black mayor, won a contested primary in 2021, knocking off incumbent Mayor Bill Peduto in a three-way primary with a plurality of the vote. . . .
The Pittsburgh mayoral race elevated housing policy to the forefront of the local discussion. Gainey has sought to enact inclusionary zoning policies throughout Pittsburgh that require new developments to set aside at least 10% of units for affordable housing. Those policies currently apply to only a few neighborhoods, and O’Connor came out against making inclusionary zoning citywide policy.

So, Pittsburg’s first black mayor tried to portray O’Connor as an evil MAGA racist and still lost the Democratic primary? This is very discouraging to those of us Republicans who are trying to trick Democrats into nominating an AOC/Crockett ticket in 2028.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jasmine Crockett

My dream of having Democrats relegate themselves to permanent loser status is jeopardized by results like Tuesday’s primary in Pittsburgh — a white male with “common sense” defeating the BLM mayor — and now I can only hope Democrats nationally don’t get a clue from this outcome.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers!



 

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Category: Democrats, Pennsylvania

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