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Tuesday evening marked the end of the hope of the mayor Ed Gainey to keep his headquarters, but his evening celebration of the evening at the Pittsburgh teachers’ federation on the south side looked more like a wake than to funeral.
While the night became increasingly dark and the advance of the County Controller of Allegheny, Corey O’Connor, on the mayor died out, the supporters of Gainey laughed, discussed and listened to the blend of DJ in the area. Even when the race was called a little after 10 p.m., the atmosphere has barely changed.
Partly because there were no screens displaying yields – generally a focal point for such events. Those who were interested in following the vote gathered for the eyes on the phones of each other. Some left by completely looking at the numbers – or claimed to do so.
When Gainey arrived in the room, after the race was called with O’Connor of more than 5 percentage points, there was a burst of applause.
“I’m not going to leave the stage before putting something in the atmosphere that continues to bring the change we need,” said Gainey.
Gainey’s criticisms of all kinds have been writing political necrologies for months – for its administration and for the progressive movement of Pittsburgh. This message has only become stronger than after its loss. But Tuesday evening, Gainey urged activists and progressives not to be abandoned.
“Don’t be defeated. … Be happy with the progress we have made,” said Gainey. “We haven’t finished yet.”
Other supporters have also celebrated the coalition he had gathered – who includes defenders of police responsibility and other social justice activists, union representatives and other progressive leaders. None seemed interested in praising the cause for the moment.
“The work we did together was the work to build a pittsburgh for the many, not a few,” said deputy mayor Jake Pawlak. “And it will continue … until we win here.”
The question of whether the result represents a reflux for progressive policy is far from clear. Some of Gainey’s injuries were self-inflicted: a drop in homicide rates was darkened by the embarrassing departure of a police chief who preferred the referee’s university basketball matches. The promises to extract more income from major non -profit organizations such as UPMC have never concluded. While the war in Gaza led to anxieties and antagonisms at home, the approach of Gainey has alienated certain hardness without satisfying anyone.
But Gainey has not only lost the race: O’Connor won him.
As indicated here previously, The progressives have succeeded in part because the political establishment has not seen them coming. Sara Innamorato won the appointment of her party for the county of the County of Allegheny in 2023, for example, while his traditional old -fashioned factions – old -fashioned democrats such as the former treasurer John Weinstein and the more liberal but friendly – concentrated technocrats have focused on each other. While the established democrats relied on outdated political tactics, progressives amplified their messages with the support of groups which had a national scope.
The O’Connor campaign is the first to effectively counter this approach, after having exploited its own network of external expenditure groups and national donors – Some wrapped in mystery. And this has a solid part of the local field led by campaign director Ben Forstate, a veteran of the defeat of Bill Peduto against Gainey in 2021, but also of a comfortable victory of the Congress Chris Deluzio during an election in 2024 which was otherwise brutal for the Democrats.
And his campaign called on the factions that had been at war with each other. You can see this during the own collection of O’Connor electoral nights.
No one hid the number of votes there: the supporters were infiltrated in Nova Place while the big screen televisions displayed the return site for the county elections alongside advertisements. And although the crowd is not what you would call various, it contained the former members of Peduto staff as well as those linked to the father of O’Connor, the late mayor Bob O’Connor, and his successor, Luke Ravenstahl.
Some participants joked about how the event was a kind of meeting for previous administrations, but these are not tribes that you would normally make, at least not where the glass beer bottles are easily at hand.
These voltages could resurface as the administration stations are equipped, as the priorities are fixed. But perhaps no politician of the city is also well placed to reconcile them as O’Connor, through his name and his approach to politics: Young by Pittsburgh Politics Standards, but also the idea of an older democrat of what a younger democrat should be.
The coalitions are built from such alliances, and progressives have also played this game: the standard excess of the movement, Bethany Hallam, helped create a majority in the council of the county of Algheny by join an old -fashioned faction linked to no one other than … John Weinstein.
O’Connor has undoubtedly overthrew this script.
The composition of the crowd on the evening of elections and districts where O’Connor has struggled the most with voters, suggest a risk of racial flaw lines in the future. But at least at the start of the campaign, Some activists who were agitated supporters of Gainey said that they did not see O’Connor as a reactionary. And O’Connor has time to face such cracks. Even before the end of the celebration of the night of the elections, the president of the municipal council Dan Lavelle – a funder – was able to be seen to take a goodwill visit to Nova Place.
Back at the Gainey event, some of the Gainey allies to the municipal council speculated on what was going to become some of its signature policies.
“I think that the efforts that the Gainey administration has launched on affordable accommodation and accommodation in the whole city has provided incredible momentum, really processing programs that I hope that we will continue in any administration,” said municipal councilor Deb Gross.
Progressive plea groups did not seem ready to throw in the towel either. Alex Wallach Hanson by Pittsburgh United, for his part, said that O’Connor and Gainey had married progressive goals – that his organization is eager to see O’Connor work to achieve.
“Corey O’Connor has launched a campaign on a similar message saying:” I’m going to be a progressive that builds affordable housing, protects Pittsburgh from Trump and ice, and offers community security “,” he said. “City voters, organizations of all kinds of problems, are looking forward to Corey to keep the campaign promises.”
Or as Gainey said, making a gesture to his gathered supporters: “Look at what we grew up. Once the seed has been watered, it never stops.”