Case StudyCaucuses

Flipped, then held.

How Change Research helped the Pennsylvania House Democratic Campaign Committee win the PA State House majority in 2022 and defend it in 2024.

64polls across two cycles

12seats flipped

22 of 23Winners called correctly in the last 30 days

Chart of poll accuracy for PAHDCC polling across the 2022 and 2024 cycles

The Challenge

Democrats needed fast, district-level reads across a state that could not be treated as one electorate.

Democrats hadn’t controlled the Pennsylvania State House in over a decade. Despite shifting demographics and evolving voter attitudes, the chamber had remained firmly in Republican hands, and conventional wisdom said it would stay that way.

When PAHDCC set out to change that in 2022, the landscape was daunting: competitive districts spread across a sprawling, diverse state. Urban, suburban, and rural battlegrounds each required distinct messaging and targeting. A one-size-fits-all approach wouldn’t work.

Two years later, the challenge flipped. The one-seat majority PAHDCC had won needed defending in a national environment that looked far more difficult for Democrats, and with the target on the caucus’s back.

Across both cycles, they needed a research partner who could field fast, accurate polling at scale, across dozens of competitive races at once, in time to actually change decisions.

The Approach

A polling program built for early depth and late movement.

Change Research partnered with PAHDCC on a polling program built around two needs: deep understanding early, fast movement late.

Custom Polls ran over the summer of each cycle, providing in-district surveys across the most competitive State House districts. These gave committee leadership granular reads on voter preferences, candidate name recognition, and which policies and messages actually landed with persuadable voters.

Spark Polls took over in the fall, delivering rapid-turnaround tracking that measured how public opinion moved in real time as events unfolded and ads went up. Every wave connected directly to a resource decision, letting PAHDCC shift investment into the races most likely to be won in the home stretch.

In 2022, the program covered 34 polls across competitive State House districts. In the 2024 cycle, Change Research conducted 28 polls of Pennsylvania State House districts. Across the cycles, the data gave committee staff a clear read on what was working and where, so PAHDCC could direct its investment into the races where each dollar and each hour would have maximum effect.

The Results

A historic flip, then a defended majority.

64Polls across two cycles

1stFlip in 12 years

HeldMajority in 2024

3.7 ptsAvg error of final margin

In 2022, Democrats flipped the Pennsylvania State House for the first time in 12 years, winning a 102 to 101 majority and picking up 12 previously Republican-held seats in a national environment that was supposed to favor the other side.

In 2024, in a far tougher national environment for Democrats, the caucus held its majority, and Change Research’s polling again tracked closely with actual results through the closing stretch.

Across both cycles, in the last 30 days of the 2022 and 2024 elections, Change Research’s PAHDCC polls predicted the winner’s vote share with an average error of just 1.9 points and the winner’s margin with an average error of 3.7 points, and correctly called the winner in 22 of 23 races. That level of accuracy, repeated across dozens of competitive races, is what let PAHDCC leadership trust the reads and defend the right seats down the stretch.

Together, the two cycles show what steady, accurate, full-cycle polling delivers for a committee operating at scale: insights fast enough to matter, and accurate enough to act on with confidence.

Madeline Zann

Executive Director, Pennsylvania House Democratic Campaign Committee

Success

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