Mar 23, 2018 3 min read

Conor Lamb, we barely knew ye.

Lamb, the winner of the recent special election to fill the remainder of the term of disgraced local congressman Tim Murphy, isn’t really going anywhere, but the congressional districts in Southwestern Pennsylvania certainly are.

The current 18th District, where Lamb topped Republican state Rep. Rick Saccone by more than 700 votes in unofficial results, will be no more at the end of this year. Washington and Greene counties, which have been represented partly by Murphy and partly by U.S. Rep Bill Shuster, will now be wholly within the new 14th District, which also includes Fayette County and part of Westmoreland County.

This is the result of an action by the state Supreme Court to impose its own, much-less-gerrymandered congressional map after Republicans in the state Legislature failed to adequately meet an order by the court to redraw the districts. Republicans challenged the court’s imposition of the new map, but a federal appeals court and the U.S. Supreme Court have both rejected Republicans’ attempts to overturn the state court’s move.

While the new districts might not allow Democrats to erase Republicans’ huge edge in congressional seats in Pennsylvania, it surely has created more competitive seats, and more districts where Democrats will at least have a chance to win. No one taking a fair look at the old districts can deny that their creation was politically motivated.

Down in our corner of the state, the new 14th District is expected to be friendly to Republican candidates, and a tough race for the GOP nomination is shaping up between Saccone and state Sen. Guy Reschenthaler. Republican Party officials chose Saccone over Reschenthaler to run against Lamb, a decision some of them might well regret after seeing Saccone stumble and fall short against Lamb in a district President Trump won by about 20 percentage points in 2016. Saccone underachieved despite having outside interests spend more than $10 million on TV ads attacking Lamb and trying to assassinate his character, and having Trump, himself, appear on Saccone’s behalf, including a visit in the closing days of the race.

Neither Saccone nor Reschenthaler lives in the newly designed 14th District, but residency in a congressional district is not a requirement to run there. In the Legislature, both have represented parts of Washington County. Their homes, however, are now in the new 18th District, but a race there against popular incumbent Democrat Mike Doyle probably was not especially palatable to them.

There are four Democrats vying for that party’s nomination in the 14th District, but it’s fair to say that whichever one of them emerges from the primary will be an underdog against the winner of the GOP nod.

As for Lamb, the Mt. Lebanon resident will be running in the new 17th District, which includes part of Allegheny County, including his home community, along with all of Beaver County and a small section of Butler County. If he emerges the victor in the Democratic primary, he’ll square off against incumbent Republican Keith Rothfus, whose seat is much less secure under the new district map.

We credit Saccone for conceding to Lamb Wednesday in the just-completed special election. There was zero legitimate evidence we saw of any significant election errors or misdeeds. Saccone was wise to shift his attention to his new race, and allow Lamb to start representing Murphy’s former constituents, who have been without a congressman for months.