Pennsylvania's newly selected gubernatorial nominees — Democrat Dan Onorato and Republican Tom Corbett — basked in the afterglow of their decisive victories Wednesday while the race to determine Onorato's running mate remained too close to call.
Onorato, Allegheny County's elected chief executive, was nominated Tuesday with 45 percent of the vote in a four-way race, according to returns from all but 21 of the state's 9,233 precincts.
Corbett, the state attorney general, attracted 69 percent of the vote in a two-man contest.
Both nominees won broad statewide support from Pennsylvania voters.
As Corbett's running mate, Republicans voters picked the GOP-endorsed candidate — Bucks County Commissioner Jim Cawley — out of a field of nine candidates.
The gubernatorial candidates appeared at separate events in the Pittsburgh on Wednesday afternoon.
Corbett defended his decision to sign a written pledge to oppose any tax increase if he's elected governor.
Earlier in the day, talking with reporters about the election, Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell criticized the pledge, calling it "lunacy" at a time when state government faces mounting fiscal challenges.
"I believe in the no-tax pledge because we can't have that option," Corbett said at rally for Pat Toomey, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate. "We've got to start cutting the budget of Pennsylvania so that we can reduce the taxes so that we can make Pennsylvania competitive."
Onorato said he reached out to his three primary opponents — state Auditor General Jack Wagner, state Sen. Anthony Hardy Williams and Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Hoeffel — to begin a discussion about unifying the party heading into the general-election campaign.
"I did talk with every one of them, we had a great conversation," he said at a news briefing at his Pittsburgh campaign headquarters. "I'm convinced we're going to rally our teams together for the fall fight."
The nominations of Corbett and Onorato — both Pittsburgh-area residents — virtually guarantee that the next governor will be a western Pennsylvanian for the first time since Erie resident Tom Ridge, a Republican, left the governorship in 2001. Rendell is from Philadelphia and his predecessor, Republican Mark Schweiker, is from Bucks County.
-- AP
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First Posted: 05/13/10 05:24 PM ET Updated: 05/25/11 05:10 PM ET