ALLENTOWN, Pa. - It's no secret that Lehigh Valley residents have been bombarded this election season with political ads. Between mailers, social media spots and TV commercials, Rep. Susan Wild (D-Lehigh/Monroe) and Republican challenger Lisa Scheller have found themselves the targets of negative hit pieces.
If it feels like this cycle is producing more of these attack ads, it's not your imagination. Political groups have spent more than $24 million on the campaign for Pennsylvania's 7th Congressional District, according to the nonprofit Open Secrets.
- Republican Lisa Scheller and Democrat Susan Wild have spent a total of $10.1 million in their campaigns for Pennsylvania's 7th Congressional District
- Scheller, owner of a Schuylkill County manufacturing company, has loaned or donated $2.6 million to her campaign
- Other groups have spent an additional $14 million on the race, according to OpenSecrets.com
That total includes spending by Scheller, Wild and third-party groups such as National Republican Congressional Committee and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
By comparison, the 2018 midterm election saw candidates and outside organizations sink $8.6 million in the PA-7 race, according to Open Records and FEC filings.
"It’s a clearly coveted seat. Not many districts nationally are this competitive," said Christopher Borick, director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion.
The 7th District is one of the few true swing districts in the country, Borick said. That gives the party out of power incentive to invest, especially when the two parties are nearly evenly split in the House. Wild is part of the eight-seat majority Democrats currently hold in the lower chamber.
The fact that Wild is a relatively new congresswoman is also a factor, Borick said. Long-time incumbents have better track records for re-election, but Wild has served just two terms. If Wild is able to keep winning elections, conservative strategists may direct outside money elsewhere.
"They might start to at least question the investment," he said, noting the 7th has more voters registered as Republicans this year, in a cycle that historically favors Republicans. "You start thinking how much people are willing to invest."
Sam Chen, who managed congressional campaigns for Kevin Dellicker and former Rep. Charlie Dent, raised his eyebrows at the $24 million figure.
"That’s not a drop in the bucket. That is not something we would regularly do back 10 years ago," he said.
In those days, Dent could get through a race with about $2.5 million, Chen said. The Lehigh Valley has higher than average costs for a congressional race since it's in the Philadelphia media market, but he said it took nowhere near the current figures to run a campaign.
Wild and Scheller spent a combined $10.1 million on their 2022 campaigns. Wild dropped more than $5.5 million, compared to the nearly $4.6 million from Scheller's campaign, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission. In addition, Dellicker spent about $293,000 in his failed bid for the Republican nomination in the primary.
The average member of Congress, by comparison, has raised $2.85 million this election cycle, according to Open Secrets.
Receipts from the Scheller and Wild campaigns show their money has been spent on commercials, salary for campaign staff, mailers and postage, internal polling, renting office space, purchasing contact information of voters and hiring consultants, among other expenditures.
Records show that Wild doesn't have a single large donor. Instead, numerous groups have donated tens of thousands of dollars. Her biggest supporters include:
- Emily's List - $56,010 - This political action committee supports Democratic women who back abortion rights.
- The University of Pennsylvania - $39,478
- Frontline USA PAC - $38,711 - The PAC is associated with Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA)
Scheller, meanwhile, has bankrolled most of her campaign. The chief executive officer of the Schuylkill County-based Silberline Manufacturing, she has loaned and donated $2.6 million to her election effort, records show. This isn't a new exercise for Scheller: in her bid to unseat Wild in 2020, she loaned her campaign $2.4 million.
However, many of the attack ads bombarding locals are paid for by third-party groups associations. The website Open Secrets reports these outside groups have spent another $14 million. Some $8.8 million of that total has been spent by groups opposing Wild compared to $4.7 million by groups against Scheller, according to Open Secrets.
But do the negative attack ads work? Borick said studies have found mixed results. But with the 7th District so evenly split between registered Republicans and Democrats, he said, political strategists will leave nothing to chance.
"Campaigns are risk averse," Borick said. "In races like this, you’re not going to be left thinking, 'Should we have run one more ad? Could we have run one more angle?'"
