It's DiNicola vs. Kelly in new 16th District
Ron DiNicola, an attorney and Marine Corps veteran from Erie, will run against U.S. Rep. Mike Kelly this fall in the new 16th District.
DiNicola defeated Chris Rieger of Cranberry Township and Robert Multari of Hermitage, Mercer County, in Tuesday's Democratic Party primary.
Democratic voters from Butler, Lawrence, Mercer, Crawford and Erie counties picked DiNicola with more than 60 percent of the vote.
Rieger, an attorney from Cranberry Township who ran for the 12th District state house seat two years ago and lost to Daryl Metcalfe, was the second-place finisher in the race with about 24 percent of the vote. Multari, a medical doctor and Mercer County native, got about 15 percent.
Unofficially, DiNicola got 23,362 votes to 9,681 for Rieger and 5,764 for Multari.
DiNicola, in an interview Tuesday night, said he was grateful to the people who voted for him and he looks forward to a “spirited” campaign against Kelly.
“I think that Mr. Kelly and I have a fundamental disagreement in what the role of a congressman should be in this region. I believe it is important to protect Social Security, Medicare, education, the environment and create economic opportunity. The Congressman has some other ideas,” he said.
DiNicola, formerly served as a law clerk to Chief U.S. District Judge Gerald Weber and Erie County solicitor. He is also known for representing Muhammad Ali and advocating for legislation to reform the sport and protect boxers.
He lives in Erie with his wife, Monica, and their three daughters.
Rieger said Tuesday night that he called DiNicola around 10:30 p.m. to congratulate him on winning the race and running a good campaign.
“Ron ran an unbelievably classy campaign. He was incredibly gracious this whole time. I told him that it was a reflection of him,” Rieger said.
Rieger said he offered the support of his team to help DiNicola take back the district for the Democrats. He said the district is more balanced now that it has been redrawn and there are many people unhappy with the status quo who are getting involved.
“We've seen a dramatic increase of grassroots participation from people who have never taken part in politics before, many of whom participated in our campaign,” he said.
DiNicola said he looks forward to sitting down with Rieger to discuss their possible collaboration.
Erie County, which has 96,699 registered Democrats, decided the race. Unofficially, DiNicola got 18,104 votes in Erie County — which accounted for 87 percent of the Democratic vote and 16,000 more than Rieger.
In Butler County, Rieger took the most votes with 3,525. DiNicola had 997 and Multari got 443, according to unofficial results.
Multari was the top vote-getter in Mercer County, where he lives. Unofficially, he got 3,263 votes to 1,283 for Rieger and 1,211 for DiNicola.
Kelly, elected to Pennsylvania's 3rd Congressional District in 2010, will seek a fifth two-year term. He was uncontested in the Republican primary.
Kelly on Tuesday won 9,558 votes from voters in Butler County and more than 40,000 from the district, according to unofficial results.
In a statement Tuesday night, he touted the recent economic successes of Congress and President Donald Trump.
“I look forward to serving a fifth term where I will fight relentlessly for Western Pennsylvanians every single day and will continue working with President Trump to make our country stronger, safer and more prosperous for every single American,” he said in the statement.
Kelly will seek votes from people who were not in his district in past election cycles.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Jan. 22 ruled that the state's congressional map was unconstitutional, a product of gerrymandering by state legislators to give an advantage to Republicans.
After the governor and legislature failed to provide a suitable replacement map, the court installed its own map, which put different parts of Butler County into the 15th, 16th and 17th districts.
Butler and Erie, Kelly's and DiNicola's respective hometowns, are still in the new 16th district, but there are significant changes.
The former 3rd District included all of Butler County, while the new 16th District includes the western half of the county, except for the southwestern portion of Cranberry Township.
Erie County, which was previously split between two districts, is now entirely included in the 16th, while Armstrong County and southern Clarion County were removed from the district.
