HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania and Republican challenger David McCormick meet for their second debate Tuesday evening, with control of the Senate on the line and tens of millions of dollars pouring into the race every week.
During their first debate two weeks ago, Casey tried to drive home the message that McCormick is a wealthy, carpetbagging ex-hedge fund CEO who got rich at the expense of Americans and will serve the interests of billionaires.
McCormick painted Casey as a weak, do-nothing out-of-touch career politician who will vote almost 100% of the time with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
Mail-in voting has already begun in the pivotal swing-state seat, and the outcome of this race, one of the nation’s most expensive, could help determine which party controls the narrowly divided Senate.
Casey, perhaps Pennsylvania’s best-known politician, is seeking a fourth term in what he calls his toughest reelection challenge yet.
Casey, 64, supported Biden's major initiatives, including his $1.9 trillion pandemic relief package, and is a staunch ally of labor unions. The former state auditor general and treasurer has won six statewide elections and is Pennsylvania’s longest-serving Democrat in the Senate. He has campaigned on preserving the middle class, abortion rights, labor rights and voting rights — and calls McCormick and former President Donald Trump a threat to all those.
McCormick, 59, is making his second run for the Senate after losing narrowly to Dr. Mehmet Oz in 2022’s Republican primary. He was CEO of Bridgewater Associates, the world's largest hedge fund, sat on Trump’s Defense Advisory Board and served in top positions under President George W. Bush. Those included posts as a Commerce undersecretary tasked with policy over controlling exports of sensitive technologies and a Treasury undersecretary as the administration tried to prevent bank failures during the recession.
McCormick backs Trump's pledge to extend the tax cuts he signed into law in 2017 and to carry out a mass deportation of immigrants who are in the country without permission — prioritizing people with criminal records. McCormick also opposes abortion rights, but said he wouldn't vote for a national ban on abortion.
Issues around border policy and the Israel-Hamas war are prominent in the race.
Democrats currently hold a Senate majority by the narrowest of margins, but face a difficult 2024 Senate map.
More than $190 million has been spent on this single race so far, according disclosures to the Federal Election Commission. The total is on track to exceed $320 million, based on campaign ad tracking by AdImpact, which includes spots reserved between now and Election Day.
The 60-minute debate will air starting at 7 p.m., hosted by WPVI -TV in Philadelphia, which will broadcast it live. Univision 65 in Philadelphia will simulcast it with Spanish language translation. Both stations will stream it live online, as will ABC News Live and Univision's VIX.
Both Casey and McCormick were uncontested for their party’s nominations. Also on the ballot in this race are John Thomas of the Libertarian Party, Leila Hazou of the Green Party and Marty Selker of the Constitution Party. They were not invited to the debate.
Follow Marc Levy at twitter.com/timelywriter.
FILE - Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., speaks before Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris arrives for a campaign event, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024, Wilkes-Barre, Pa. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke,File)
FILE - David McCormick, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, pauses during a speech at a campaign event at the Beerded Goat Brewing Co., April 25, 2024, in Harrisburg, Pa. (AP Photo/Marc Levy, File)
FILE - This combination of photos taken in Pennsylvania shows Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., left, at a campaign event, Sept. 13, 2024, in Wilkes-Barre, and David McCormick, the Republican nominee for Senate in Pennsylvania, at a campaign event, April 25, 2024, in Harrisburg. (AP Photo, File)
The Christmas tradition has become nearly global in scope: Children from around the world track Santa Claus as he sweeps across the earth, delivering presents and defying time.
Each year, at least 100,000 kids call into the North American Aerospace Defense Command to inquire about Santa’s location. Millions more follow online in nine languages, from English to Japanese.
On any other night, NORAD is scanning the heavens for potential threats, such as last year’s Chinese spy balloon. But on Christmas Eve, volunteers in Colorado Springs are fielding questions like, “When is Santa coming to my house?” and, “Am I on the naughty or nice list?”
“There are screams and giggles and laughter,” said Bob Sommers, 63, a civilian contractor and NORAD volunteer.
Sommers often says on the call that everyone must be asleep before Santa arrives, prompting parents to say, “Do you hear what he said? We got to go to bed early.”
NORAD’s annual tracking of Santa has endured since the Cold War, predating ugly sweater parties and Mariah Carey classics. The tradition continues regardless of government shutdowns, such as the one in 2018, and this year.
Here’s how it began and why the phones keep ringing.
It started with a child’s accidental phone call in 1955. The Colorado Springs newspaper printed a Sears advertisement that encouraged children to call Santa, listing a phone number.
A boy called. But he reached the Continental Air Defense Command, now NORAD, a joint U.S. and Canadian effort to spot potential enemy attacks. Tensions were growing with the Soviet Union, along with anxieties about nuclear war.
Air Force Col. Harry W. Shoup picked up an emergency-only “red phone” and was greeted by a tiny voice that began to recite a Christmas wish list.
“He went on a little bit, and he takes a breath, then says, ‘Hey, you’re not Santa,’” Shoup told The Associated Press in 1999.
Realizing an explanation would be lost on the youngster, Shoup summoned a deep, jolly voice and replied, “Ho, ho, ho! Yes, I am Santa Claus. Have you been a good boy?”
Shoup said he learned from the boy’s mother that Sears mistakenly printed the top-secret number. He hung up, but the phone soon rang again with a young girl reciting her Christmas list. Fifty calls a day followed, he said.
In the pre-digital age, the agency used a 60-by-80 foot (18-by-24 meter) plexiglass map of North America to track unidentified objects. A staff member jokingly drew Santa and his sleigh over the North Pole.
The tradition was born.
“Note to the kiddies,” began an AP story from Colorado Springs on Dec. 23, 1955. “Santa Claus Friday was assured safe passage into the United States by the Continental Air Defense Command.”
In a likely reference to the Soviets, the article noted that Santa was guarded against possible attack from “those who do not believe in Christmas.”
Some grinchy journalists have nitpicked Shoup’s story, questioning whether a misprint or a misdial prompted the boy’s call.
In 2014, tech news site Gizmodo cited an International News Service story from Dec. 1, 1955, about a child’s call to Shoup. Published in the Pasadena Independent, the article said the child reversed two digits in the Sears number.
“When a childish voice asked COC commander Col. Harry Shoup, if there was a Santa Claus at the North Pole, he answered much more roughly than he should — considering the season:
‘There may be a guy called Santa Claus at the North Pole, but he’s not the one I worry about coming from that direction,’” Shoup said in the brief piece.
In 2015, The Atlantic magazine doubted the flood of calls to the secret line, while noting that Shoup had a flair for public relations.
Phone calls aside, Shoup was indeed media savvy. In 1986, he told the Scripps Howard News Service that he recognized an opportunity when a staff member drew Santa on the glass map in 1955.
A lieutenant colonel promised to have it erased. But Shoup said, “You leave it right there,” and summoned public affairs. Shoup wanted to boost morale for the troops and public alike.
“Why, it made the military look good — like we’re not all a bunch of snobs who don’t care about Santa Claus,” he said.
Shoup died in 2009. His children told the StoryCorps podcast in 2014 that it was a misprinted Sears ad that prompted the phone calls.
“And later in life he got letters from all over the world,” said Terri Van Keuren, a daughter. “People saying ‘Thank you, Colonel, for having, you know, this sense of humor.’”
NORAD’s tradition is one of the few modern additions to the centuries-old Santa story that have endured, according to Gerry Bowler, a Canadian historian who spoke to the AP in 2010.
Ad campaigns or movies try to “kidnap” Santa for commercial purposes, said Bowler, who wrote “Santa Claus: A Biography.” NORAD, by contrast, takes an essential element of Santa’s story and views it through a technological lens.
In a recent interview with the AP, Air Force Lt. Gen. Case Cunningham explained that NORAD radars in Alaska and Canada —- known as the northern warning system — are the first to detect Santa.
He leaves the North Pole and typically heads for the international dateline in the Pacific Ocean. From there he moves west, following the night.
“That’s when the satellite systems we use to track and identify targets of interest every single day start to kick in,” Cunningham said. “A probably little-known fact is that Rudolph’s nose that glows red emanates a lot of heat. And so those satellites track (Santa) through that heat source.”
NORAD has an app and website, www.noradsanta.org, that will track Santa on Christmas Eve from 4 a.m. to midnight, mountain standard time. People can call 1-877-HI-NORAD to ask live operators about Santa’s location from 6 a.m. to midnight, mountain time.
FILE - Santa tracker volunteer Meghan Huyck, right, and other volunteers answer phone calls from children all over the world at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo., Dec. 24, 2017. (Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette via AP, File)
FILE – Canadian Lt. Maj. Chris Hache takes a call while volunteering at the NORAD Tracks Santa center at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo., Dec. 24, 2017. (Jerilee Bennett/The Gazette via AP, File)
FILE - This image provided by NORAD — the North American Aerospace Defense Command, responsible for monitoring and defending the skies above North America — shows NORAD's Santa Tracker. (NORAD via AP, File)
FILE - NORAD Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Charles D. Luckey takes a call while volunteering at the NORAD Tracks Santa center at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo., Dec. 24, 2014. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley, File)
