By John L. Micek Tuesday Morning Coffee, Pennsylvania Capital-Star
Good Tuesday Morning, Fellow Seekers.
Democratic 10th Congressional District candidate Eugene DePasquale is on the air with his first campaign ad, a biographical spot called “Restaurant,” that punches up his blue-collar roots as the son of a Pittsburgh bar owner.
“I grew up in a bar. My family was working class,” DePasquale says in the 30-second spot filmed inside a bar that should be plenty familiar to thirsty central Pennsylvanians — the Sturges Speakeasy on Forster Street in Harrisburg, across the street from the Capitol.
“When I wasn’t bussing tables, I umpired Little League games and worked as a janitor to pay for college,” he continues, wiping down the bar and pouring suds. “I learned a lot of life lessons from the people in my neighborhood.”
DePasquale told the Capital-Star that his family owned a bar in Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood.
It was initially called Allie’s, before it changed its name to the Panther Hollow Inn in 1981. As the name suggests, the bar sat between the campuses of Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh. It has since closed, his campaign said.
The spot will start airing today in the greater Harrisburg media market, which includes all three counties in the district: Cumberland, Dauphin and York counties, and run through Election Day.
DePasquale’s campaign would only say it was “investing six figures a week,” on the spot, which will air on broadcast and cable outlets in the district, as well as online.
While it doesn’t say it out loud, or mention his name, the ad feels like a deliberate attempt to neutralize some of the working class cred claimed by GOP incumbent U.S. Rep. Scott Perry. While overwhelmingly suburban, the district also takes in some of the more rural and blue-collar precincts of Cumberland and York counties.
In a 2018 interview with PennLive, Perry said he grew up the son of a single mother (who eventually remarried); had no relationship to speak of with his birth father, and grew up in a house without electricity or indoor plumbing. In fact, “for a period of several years, Perry has [2018] told campaign audiences, the family lived using a generator for power, taking their water from a pump, and making full use of an outhouse on the property,” PennLive reported.
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