In Pennsylvania, Undecided Voters Are Torn Between Faith And A Party That Was Once A Way Of Life

EASTERN PENNSYLVANIA — Religion runs deep in eastern Pennsylvania. Through mountains and valleys, in once-thriving mining and factory towns, Catholic steeples dot low skylines. In smoky pool halls, Monday afternoon drinkers would rather talk about the Knights of Columbus than national politics. Man for man, they’re lifelong Democrats — or once thought so.

It’s common for American families to transmit political values from generation to generation, alongside religion, eye color, and heart disease. In eastern Pennsylvania, it’s not that simple. When working out how to vote, the issues and platform are important, but so is how dad voted, how grandma would have voted.

All of this comes into the booth with the people we spoke to, and for them, the Democratic Party isn’t just a choice, it’s the working-class, it’s the union, it’s the grandparents, and until some time recently they can’t quite put their fingers on, it was Catholic and it was pro-life. In 2020, they see full well that something is very wrong.

Just over an hour north of Philadelphia, the historic city of Bethlehem sits nestled into the Lehigh Valley. For nearly the whole of the 20th century, Bethlehem Steel was synonymous with American industry — and American power. Their factories built beams strong enough to raise the greatest buildings the world had ever seen, and during the Second World War, as much as 60 percent of the United States’ guns, 40 percent of her shells, and “one-fifth of the entire fleet.”