Does It Shock You When Conservative Democrats Switch Parties? It Shouldn't. Meet John Yudichak

John Yudichak just guaranteed that the GOP will hold power in the Pennsylvania state Senate

The Republican Party tent is way too small-- a virtually pup tent filled with racists and xenophobes with increasingly less room for anyone else. But the Democratic Party tent is way too big-- everyone is welcome no matter what they believe in. You get Democrats who vote further to the right than even Republicans on core party values... which have been getting fuzzier and fuzzier. And this hurts the party in many ways. People don't know what the hell it even stands for. A "Democrat" like Chicago walking freak show, Dan Lipinski co-sponsors anti-LGBTQ legislation and anti-Choice legislation. And ever further right member, freshman Antony Brindisi goes whining to leadership every time a progressive proposal is made, weeping that it jeopardizes his reelection.

Look at the bottom of the ProgressivePunch ratings for House Democrats' lifetime crucial vote scores. By the scores, it would be hard to impossible to say who's a Democrat and who's a Republican-- and not because the Republicans are voting like Democrat's. That cross-over is one-way.

• Henry Cuellar (Blue Dog-TX)- 39.40%
• Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN)- 39.09%
• Cindy Axne (New Dem-IA)- 38.78%
• Josh Gottheimer (Blue Dog-NJ)- 38.34%
• Ben McAdams (Blue Dog-UT)- 34.69%
• Abigail Spanberger (Blue Dog-VA)- 34.69%
• Justin Amash (Independent-MI)- 32.93%
• Jared Golden (D-ME)- 32.65%
• Kendra Horn (Blue Dog-OK)- 32.65%
• Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA)- 29.02%
• Thomas Massie (R-KY)- 28.30%
• Joe Cunningham (Blue Dog-SC)- 26.53%
• Anthony Brindisi (Blue Dog-NY)- 24.49%
• John Katko (R-NY)- 21.39%
• Jeff Van Drew (Blue Dog-NJ)- 20.41%
• Elise Stefanik (R-NY)- 16.24%
• Chris Smith (R-NJ)- 15.93%

Tuesday night and Monday morning I talked about 2 Blue Dogs who could easily slip over to the Dark Side-- Trump apologist Jeff Van Drew, whose departure to the GOP is probably imminent and Dan Lipinski, who would probably flip to the Republican Party if Marie Newman defeats him in the primary.

Let's move to the Pennsylvania legislature, where Democrats looked to be on the verge of flipping the General Assembly from red to blue. Right now the gerrymandered Senate has 28 Republicans and 22 21 Democrats and the House has 110 Republicans and 93 Democrats. Tuesday, the most conservative Democrat in the state Senate, John Yudichak, left the Democratic Party and is now caucusing with the GOP.

Yudichak represents Carbon County and part of Luzerne County (including Wilkes-Barre). In 2016 both counties were essentially tied between Bernie and Hillary in the primary-- Bernie slightly ahead in Carbon and Hillary slightly ahead in Luzerne. In the general, Carbon County voted 18,714 (65.2%) to 8,917 (31.0%) for Trump. Luzerne voted 77,508 (58.4%) to 51,454 (38.8%). Two years later Luzerne County voted to reelect Governor Tom Wolf (D) and Carbon voted against his reelection. Luzerne is the biggest vote source in the newly drawn 8th district and it went for Matt Cartwright (D). The parts of Luzerne and Carbon in the 9th congressional district next door went strongly for conservative Republican Dan Meuser, who was being challenged by a worthless Republican-lite Blue Dog, Denny Wolff. Republicans were perfectly happy with Yudichak and didn't bother running anyone against him. The state Senate district voted for Obama both times and then for Trump.

Yudichak-- a fracking and coal whore-- was first elected to the state House in 1999 and then to the state Senate in 2011. He now says he's a better fit with the Republicans than with the Democrats and says he sees that as "less of a purist party." The purist party had made the worst Climate denier among Senate Dems the minority chair of the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee.

The move takes the minority Democratic caucus from 22 to 21, and it has the feeling of blunting some of the momentum Democrats felt after gaining six seats since the 2016 elections. Republicans currently hold 27 seats, with one vacant seat set to be filled in a January special election.

Yudichak - whose next re-election campaign would be 2022 - will be the chamber’s sole Independent, though he will be apparently draw new committee assignments through the Republican leadership.

Senate Democrat Leader Jay Costa, a Pittsburgh Democrat who turned back a leadership challenge from Yudichak in after the 2016 elections, issued this statement on the defection Tuesday:

"Our Democratic caucus prides itself on our advocacy for working people, for fair wages, affordable and accessible health care, and access to every opportunity the Commonwealth has to offer-- regardless of race, gender, or creed.

“This Democratic caucus and the Democratic Party as a whole promotes a “large tent” approach, and we welcome debate and diverse opinions within our membership, and will continue to do so. We’re extremely disappointed to see Senator Yudichak turn his back on those values and his Senate colleagues who have supported him since his first election to this chamber in 2010.”

A top Senate staffer who keeps me up on what goes on in Harrisburg told me that Yudichak "left largely because our awful leader, Jay Costa, was nasty to him. If he doesn't think you're loyal to him, he treats you like shit. This is a terrible way to run a caucus. And these are the consequences. We lost an important seat and now we're not going to win back the Senate. Every time I see you writing about that Costa in California, I have a glimmer of hope you're writing about our own jackass Costa... Yudichak isn't as bad as you think he is. He can be worked with."