In contrast to states that are reliably Democratic or reliably GOP, Pennsylvania continues to act like the consummate swing state. Pennsylvania presently has a moderate Democratic governor (Josh Shapiro), a conservative Republican U.S. senator (Dave McCormick) and a Democratic U.S. senator who sometimes bucks his party on key votes (John Fetterman) — and Donald Trump won Pennsylvania in 2016 and lost it in 2020 only to win it a second time in 2024.
Republicans who win statewide in Pennsylvania typically need a strong turnout in the rural parts of the state. But according to National Public Radio (NPR)'s Rebecca Hersher, rural Pennsylvania towns are being imperiled by the Trump Administration's failure to adequately fund disaster preparedness and the Federal Emergency Management Agence (FEMA).
"The current round of funding includes extra assistance for 'small impoverished communities,' promising that the federal government will pay a larger share of the total project costs if those communities win grants," Hersher explains in an article published on March 30. "But in the last year, agency leaders have reversed most initiatives put in place under the Biden Administration, including changes that were meant to ensure that such communities could compete with large, densely populated cities and states, which often have teams of full-time grant-writers and emergency managers. Rural communities and smaller towns, by comparison, often struggle to apply for large federal grants."
One Pennsylvania town that is increasingly vulnerable to flooding from the Lackawanna River, according to Hersher, is Duryea.
"Since the 1970s," Hersher reports, "a tall earthen levee has protected Duryea from floodwaters. But the river gets higher than it used to. Changes in the river due to development, combined with the effects of climate change, which makes heavy rain more common, mean that Duryea faces more water now than in the past."
Laura Holbrook, director of flood protection for Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, told WHYY that Duryea's levee needs to be raised by about three feet in order to adequately protect the town against severe flooding.
"However, getting the Duryea levee fixed has been impossible so far," Hersher notes. "Local authorities sank hundreds of thousands of dollars into designs for the levee upgrades, in the hopes of quickly applying for $11 million in federal funds to complete the repairs. But there's been no way to access federal grants for such projects over the last year because the Trump Administration has withheld billions of dollars for disaster preparedness and prevention that local governments, especially those in rural areas, rely on…. And the current administration's hostility to projects related to climate change also raises questions about what types of infrastructure will get the green light for federal funding in the future."
Hersher adds, "For example, sea walls and wildfire-related home protection efforts address the effects of sea level rise and more extreme wildfires, which are directly linked to climate change."