McClure defeats newcomer Lynch in Northampton County exec race

Democrat Lamont McClure won another term as Northampton County executive, thanks to a huge haul of mail-in ballots that put him out of the reach of firebrand Republican challenger Steve Lynch.

The incumbent said he is looking forward to another term of reducing economic burdens on taxpayers and pushing growth in the county. Lynch, meanwhile, is already pledging an investigation of the election, telling followers on Facebook to prepare for “phase 2.”

According to unofficial results, McClure had 37,404 votes to Lynch’s 29,628. Of McClure’s total, 18,025 were mail ballots, while Lynch had 3,254.

In all, 69,854 votes were cast, translating to a turnout of 31.8%.

Lynch did not return requests for comment Wednesday, but posted a message on Facebook:

“The age of corruption will be coming to an end in Northampton County. They have no idea who they messed with!” he wrote. “God’s people are just beginning this march! I am invigorated to eviscerate the swamp creatures in our county and their evil deeds... This administration and their minions miscalculated big time messing with me, my family, and We the People. Lions are now circling.”

In response to one follower’s comment on the post, Lynch wrote: “This will all be investigated!”

McClure wouldn’t comment on Lynch’s post, but said the outcome showed that county residents “have rejected the extremes.”

“I think the message was pretty clear they want us to continue on the middle path,” he said. “They expect moderation in their government affairs at the local level.”

Looking ahead to his next term, McClure said he will push to fulfill a campaign pledge to cut county taxes 8.5%, to take some burden off residents facing inflation in stores and at the gas pumps.

“We recognize it’s your county taxes, it’s not your biggest tax bill, but it will help,” he said.

McClure credited his win to his focus on issues relevant to voters. While Lynch railed against vaccine mandates and “critical race theory,” McClure campaigned on his record and targeted households with mailers early and often.

By the week before the election, “there were about six pieces of mail in the hands of approximately 50,000 households who, we understood from voting history, would be voting,” he said.

Still, McClure might have been vulnerable to a stronger opponent, said Chris Borick, a Muhlenberg College political science professor and director of the school’s Institute of Public Opinion.

“He was going in as a Democrat in a cycle favoring Republicans,” Borick said, noting how well GOP candidates fared in county council and judicial races. “You saw a really good night for Republicans, with one glaring exception — Steve Lynch. He was a flawed candidate and that opened the door to an easy victory [for McClure].”

Lynch’s overheated rhetoric and suggestion that corruption tainted the election is unsurprising, given that the political novice ran his campaign according to the playbook of former President Donald Trump.

Like Trump, Lynch was stung by the fact that far more Democrats than Republicans voted by mail. Lynch beat McClure in the voting booth — 25,540 votes to McClure’s 19,518 — but he lost badly at the post office.

Borick said the Republican aversion to voting by mail — Trump railed against it, calling it open to fraud — is already beginning to change, at least outside the MAGA core, because of Democrats’ success with the practice.

The race was unusual from the start. Local Republican leaders said they wanted a field of candidates more in line with Trump, who carried the county by nearly 4 percentage points in 2016 before losing by a point to Joe Biden in 2020.

They found that in spades in Lynch, a Northampton bodybuilder and fitness coach who had never run for or held office. He spent much of his campaign echoing conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, attacking mask and vaccine mandates, and appealing to voters’ patriotism. When he discussed county matters, it was usually to criticize incumbents for not doing more to obstruct the state and federal government.

McClure spent more than $257,000 on his campaign, about double what past executive candidates have spent in recent years. Much of his fundraising went toward weekly mailers and YouTube videos labeling Lynch as a domestic terrorist and insurrectionist too dangerous to elect.