Clinton campaign turns eyes to Pennsylvania

One question arising recently has been whether or not Hillary Clinton's campaign felt it needed to fight to win Pennsylvania. Its first ad buy following Clinton becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee didn't include the Keystone State even though many expect it to be a battleground in 2016. As The Hill reports, whatever the official campaign's strategy may be, its allies aren't forgetting Pennsylvania:

Clinton campaign seeks to shut door on Trump in Pennsylvania

Hillary Clinton’s allies are working to close off Donald Trump’s gains in Pennsylvania and keep the pressure on the presumptive GOP presidential nominee in an important state to his bid.

The Clinton effort hadn’t prioritized early ad spending in the Keystone State, whose electoral votes haven’t gone to a Republican since 1988.

Although neither the campaign nor its main supporting super-PAC included Pennsylvania in its first round of ad buys, the super-PAC Priorities USA announced a $10 million ad campaign across the state last week after two polls this month pegged the race as a statistical tie.

Regarding the Clinton campaign's decision to not invest in Pennsylvania at this point, Terry Madonna, a political scientist at Franklin & Marshall College in Pennsylvania, suggests it is simply following the route President Obama took in 2012 in passing over the state until the final weeks of the campaign. Obama won the state by about five percentage points.

Donald Trump is thought by some to have strong appeal to blue-collar voters, and if so Pennsylvania is a state he ought to be competitive in. If this turns out to be the case, the Clinton team may yet rue opting not to include the state in its early media plans.