Looking for a win in the 'Pennsylvania T'

HERSHEY, Pa. - On trips to Pennsylvania this month, Sen. Ted Cruz twice made sure to stop in central Pennsylvania.

The area is rich with Republican voters, and even richer with the conservatives for whom Cruz's message of smaller government and Christian conservatism will resonate.

Analysts say the state's midsection is a key battleground for the GOP presidential candidates and Cruz in particular. The Texas senator must do well here if he hopes to have a chance in Tuesday's Republican primary.

"It's still a Republican fortress around here," said pollster and political analyst G. Terry Madonna of Franklin and Marshall College, referring to the "Pennsylvania T," a corridor that runs across the top of the state and then down the middle between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. "And they are more conservative. There is a fair number of evangelicals and born-again Christians."

Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans statewide, and particularly in the state's urban and more densely populated corners. But the GOP dominates here. Most of the counties surrounding Harrisburg, for instance, overwhelmingly log more Republicans.

Those GOP voters tend to place high priority not just on the traditional party values of smaller government and lower taxes, but also on key social issues such as guns and abortion.

A Franklin and Marshall poll being released Thursday shows that Donald Trump holds a 14-point lead over Cruz statewide and a 16-point edge over Ohio Gov. John Kasich. But the divide shrinks considerably when broken down by geography.

In the central part of the state, Trump leads Cruz by only 5 percentage points. Meanwhile, Trump and Kasich are battling it out for GOP voters around Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, where Cruz lags far behind.

"The whole 'T' section of Pennsylvania is prime territory for Cruz because it is very conservative, and Cruz is the true constitutional conservative in the race," said Lowman Henry, who heads a conservative Harrisburg research and polling center and is running Cruz's campaign in Pennsylvania.

Still, central Pennsylvania is not a sure win for Cruz, observers say.

Trump's message, aimed at disaffected voters, has shattered any one candidate's ability to target sections of the state as surefire nerve centers of support, said Charlie Gerow, a longtime GOP consultant.

Republican strategist Jeff Coleman, a former state representative who supports Kasich, put it this way: "Donald Trump, to many people, sounds like someone who calls in regularly to the local talk show . . . a person who has a very definite opinion of what is right and wrong and thinks in terms of one-sentence solutions. It's a culture, and it's not confined to just one part of the state."

The polls also show the race is still up for grabs, with many undecided voters. In the mid-state area, that number hovers at just under 20 percent, according to Madonna's poll.

Jennifer Story is one of those voters. A Lancaster mother who attended Wednesday's rally for Cruz with her two children, Story said she was wavering between Cruz and Kasich.

The issues that will drive her decision run along the social spectrum. She is anti-abortion, home-schools her children, and believes in "the moral qualities of the Bible."

For her, Trump is not an option. She doesn't like that he feeds voters' anger, rather than trying to find solutions to tamp it down.

"It incites mob mentality," Story said.

Richard Backstrom of Mount Wolf was not as conflicted. He is a Cruz supporter, "a believer in our Second Amendment rights."

And he says Trump is secretly a foil, running to win the Republican nomination and ensure that Hillary Clinton wins the White House.

"I don't believe he entered the race to win," said Backstrom, a Vietnam veteran. "Trump got into the race to get Hillary elected."

acouloumbis@phillynews.com

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