BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Bob Brooks, the everyman candidate backed by the Democratic Party's establishment, appeared to have pulled away with his party's nomination in Pennsylvania's crowded 7th Congressional District primary Tuesday night.
Brooks, a retired city firefighter and president of the Pennsylvania Professional Fire Fighters Association, declared victory shortly before 10 p.m.
A Moore Township resident, Brooks had never before run for office, but boasted a slew of high-profile endorsements, including Gov. Josh Shapiro, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and former presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg.
"That's what this is all about. It's taking on broken Washington to give working people a voice in Congress. This win is for every worker who's watched politicians in both parties make promises and let us down."Presumptive 7th Congressional District Democratic nominee Bob Brooks
His campaign highlighted his blue-collar credentials and his history of picking up odd jobs — bartender, truck driver and teamster to name a few — to put food on the table.
Brooks said the Lehigh Valley deserves a candidate who understands first-hand the struggles too many families fight for increasingly expensive housing, utilities, gas and groceries.
"That's what this is all about," Brooks told a throng of supporters at his watch party at Artisan, a cheese cellar on West Lehigh Street.
"It's taking on broken Washington to give working people a voice in Congress. This win is for every worker who's watched politicians in both parties make promises and let us down."
As of 9:51 p.m., unofficial results from the state website showed Brooks with a commanding 19-point lead.
Former federal prosecutor Ryan Crosswell and former Northampton County Executive Lamont McClure were in a virtual tie for second place. Energy engineer Carol Obando-Derstine brought up the rear.
After thanking his opponents for the spirited campaign, Brooks turned his attention to his November opponent, U.S. Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, R-Lehigh Valley.
Mackenzie, a Harvard Business School graduate who's spent most of his adult life in elected office, will serve as a hard foil to Brooks.
"He's worked in Harrisburg and he's worked in Congress, but he's never held a job outside of politics. Not a day in his life," Brooks said. "It's about time he fills out an application."
Around the same time, Mackenzie's campaign fired off an email criticizing Brooks as a con-man and fraudster.
The Republican campaign said the Democratic Party pumped millions of dollars into a primary to back their preferred candidate despite lawsuits claiming he scammed his former in-laws and allegations his union endorsed Republican Stacy Garrity in 2024 at Shapiro's request.
"These groups steamrolled local Democrats and hijacked the democratic process in order to nominate a a corrupt political insider, a wealthy lobbyist with a vast stock portfolio and someone who has a record of stealing from his own family," Mackenzie spokesman Arnaud Armstrong said in a prepared statement.
Campaigns on backgrounds, qualifications
The Democratic candidates were closely aligned on most major issues, and much of their attention on the campaign trail targeted Mackenzie and President Donald Trump for not addressing runaway expenses.
Instead, the race often rested on the backgrounds and qualifications of the candidates.
In an interview with LehighValleyNews.com Tuesday night, Brooks credited his victory to his authenticity and ability to connect with the lived experiences of voters in the district.
"People are feeling hurt. They're feeling the pain, and they want someone who's been through that pain and knows how to fight out of it."Presumptive 7th Congressional District Democratic nominee Bob Brooks on why voters backed his campaign over his Democratic competitors
"I haven't lived the perfect life," Brooks said. "I've taken food stamps. It's not a speech, it's real. That's what people are seeing, that's who they want to represent them.
"People are feeling hurt. They're feeling the pain, and they want someone who's been through that pain and knows how to fight out of it."
The district has drawn international attention as one of the most contested toss-ups in the U.S. House. The past few election cycles in the district were narrowly decided; Mackenzie won the seat by just 1 percentage point in 2024.
With the major political parties engaged in a gerrymander tit-for-tat in California, Texas, North Carolina and elsewhere, PA-7 is among just a handful of competitive House seats left in the country.
A test of party's influence
In some ways, the primary turned into a test of the Democratic Party's ability to influence voters in the Lehigh Valley.
Shapiro endorsed Brooks last year and stuck with him despite some campaign flubs and a lawsuit seeking to collect on a $162,000 debt Brooks owes his former mother-in-law.
With his own gubernatorial campaign unchallenged, Shapiro campaigned on Brooks's behalf in Emmaus on Sunday.
Shapiro isn't the only high-profile name to come out in favor of Brooks. U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont; former presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg; U.S. reps. Madeleine Dean, Chris Diluzio, Mary Scanlon, all D-Pennsylvania; and Jamie Raskin, D-Maryland gave Brooks their endorsements.
Diluzio and U.S. Rep. Val Hoyle, D-Oregon, were both at Brooks' watch party Tuesday night.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which usually sits out primary battles, spent money to boost Brooks, as well.
But Democratic leaders weren't the only ones seeking to change voter behaviors.
FEC filings show two mysterious political action committees were created late in the cycle. One of them, the Florida-based Lead Left PAC, spent more than $1 million in the closing days of the race.
Punch Bowl News reported that the group's website at one point included meta-data tying it to the WinRed, an official fundraising platform for the Republican Party.
The Lead Left ads attacked Brooks and Crosswell while promoting McClure, whose lack of funding had left him unable to match his opponents with TV spots and mailers.
All four Democratic candidates denounced the ads as political interference and McClure called on all the candidates to reject outside spending.
'Mackenzie has to go'
All four candidates held their watch parties in and around downtown Bethlehem.
Obando-Derstine celebrated the culmination of her primary campaign at Mis Raices, a Colombian restaurant on West Broad Street.
Obando-Derstine, the only woman and Latina in the field, said she felt it was important to “celebrate here, at a Colombian restaurant, my roots as a Colombian-American.”
Initial unofficial results showed her in fourth place as she spoke to supporters early in the night, shortly after polls closed at 8 p.m.
“No matter what happens tonight, I am so proud of what we built together,” she said.
“We brought people together into this process who felt unseen and unheard. We ran a campaign rooted in community, compassion and hardwork, integrity.”
“Come what may, this is just the beginning,” she said.
Obando-Derstine's campaign manager said the candidate planned to watch results pour in at home with her team after a day that left many “completely exhausted.”
Ryan Crosswell arrived at his watch party at the Red Stag’s upstairs bar just after 9 p.m., when unofficial results on the room's TV showed him in second place.
Within about a half-hour, former Northampton County Executive Lamont McClure surpassed Crosswell to take second place, according to those unofficial results.
The former federal prosecutor had not yet spoken to his supporters when Brooks declared victory just before 10 p.m. at Artisan.
Crosswell, his campaign manager, and some family and staffers went downstairs around the same time, and some supporters began to leave the Red Stag minutes later as news of Brooks’ victory declaration spread through the room.
Less than a half-mile north at the Grover Cleveland Democratic Association, McClure was preparing his own concession speech.
He congratulated Brooks for running a “good campaign” campaign and urged some of his jeering supporters to rally around the expected Democratic nominee.
“Politics isn’t fair, right? You leverage what you have, what advantages you have,” McClure said. “And he did it brilliantly.”
He also credited Obando-Derstine’s “great, great campaign” and Crosswell for spreading “a great message that a lot of people listened to, they liked, and they grabbed onto.”
“I mean, I didn’t believe it, but a lot of people did,” McClure said. “So you really have to give him credit for that."
McClure said he believes the three candidates who lost Tuesday night will rally behind Brooks’ campaign.
“I think we're going to be very supportive of our candidate going forward in the future — because, look, Mackenzie needs to go,” McClure said.
“He absolutely needs to go, and it doesn't matter what the vehicle is to make that happen.”
