Hedge Fund Manager David McCormick Joins Pennsylvania Senate Race

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One on One With David McCormick, the Latest Candidate in the Pa. Senate Race

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David McCormick enters crowded Pa. U.S. Senate race; will seek Republican nomination

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Republican David McCormick, the former chief executive of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund, has entered the race for Pennsylvania’s open U.S. Senate seat.

McCormick, a West Point graduate and Army veteran with familial ties to Pennsylvania, joins the crowded field for what is expected to be one of the most contested — and costly — midterm elections in the country.

Whoever fills the seat will replace retiring GOP U.S. Sen Pat Toomey, and the race could determine which party controls the upper chamber in Washington.

The 56-year-old Pennsylvania native, who most recently lived in Connecticut, officially announced his campaign Thursday morning, after weeks of widely reported hints toward making a run. McCormick resigned from his post at the hedge fund earlier this month. He also has purchased a home in the Pittsburgh area and ran political ads in western Pennsylvania ahead of his campaign announcement.

McCormick, whose wife served as deputy national security advisor to former President Donald Trump, was also considered for positions under the previous administration, Politico reported.

His announcement comes one week after the Pennsylvania Democratic Party filed a complaint against McCormick — and fellow GOP U.S. Senate Candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz — for his campaign ads without formally declaring his candidacy.

In one of the ads, McCormick described the race as “a battle for the heart and soul of America.”

Though he will bring deep pockets to the race, McCormick’s critics, including Oz, have already looked to job cuts he oversaw as president of the online auction service FreeMarkets Inc. and Bridgewater Associates’ investments in China. McCormick likely faces speculation over his residency as potential weaknesses, joining Oz and Carla Sands, a former Trump administration ambassador to Denmark.

In a statement released Thursday morning, Oz described McCormick as “Beijing’s favorite candidate” who has a “sterling record of enriching the Chinese Communist Party.”

Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, state Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, Montgomery County Commissioner Val Arkoosh, and U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb, who represents the 17th District, are among the candidates vying for the Democratic nomination.

The primary election is on May 17.

Time for America’s leaders to confront China’s Communist Party head on

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As an Army combat paratrooper, I learned two things: always be clear-eyed about your enemy and never forget that there’s only one language that matters — strength.

That’s why I believe it is past time for America’s leaders to confront head-on the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which poses the greatest economic and national security threat to the United States.

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If given the honor of representing Pennsylvania in the U.S. Senate, I will do everything in my power to end our dependence on China, protect our communities and our jobs, counter their attempts to reshape the world in their authoritarian image, and ensure America remains the world’s unrivaled military and economic superpower.

For years, China has oppressed its own people while getting rich through unfair trade deals with America and by stealing our technology, intellectual property, and personal information. They have directly threatened our nation’s health, prosperity, and security, and that of all Pennsylvanians.

The CCP knows Chinese manufacturers couldn’t compete head-to-head with Pennsylvania workers, so they unlawfully dumped steel to undercut our fair prices, unfairly subsidized their companies, manipulated their currency, and stole our intellectual property, with no accountability.

The result? Since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, the Commonwealth has lost over 137,000 jobs, many in the manufacturing sector.

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Among the many great companies from which they stole technology and trade secrets is U.S. Steel. The Chinese military has even sought to infiltrate our world-class universities, including recruiting a Penn State professor in a scheme to use American taxpayer dollars to help “develop China’s expertise… through his undisclosed partnership with a Chinese university controlled by the Chinese government.”

And most destructive of all, the CCP unleashed COVID-19 on the world, killing nearly 38,000 Pennsylvanians, forcing businesses to close, and doing untold mental and emotional damage to our children, all while they accelerated the most dangerous military buildup in recent memory.

President Trump did our nation a great service by standing up for the principles of fairness, security, and reciprocity. Pennsylvanians would say this seems obvious. A grand jury of Pennsylvanians brought the first ever criminal charges against Chinese state actors because we know our trading partners must play by the same rules we do and should suffer the consequences when they don’t.

The Biden administration just doesn’t get it. That is why now more than ever we need new leadership in Washington to boldly defend our national interests. That’s what putting America first is all about, and it’s exactly the kind of leadership that I have always stood for.

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I have been in the room with Chinese leaders. I know how they negotiate. In fact, I took such a hard line approach during my time serving in government that top Chinese leaders appealed to the president of the United States to soften the technology controls I put in place. And as a businessman, I developed a reputation for viewing China as the threat it is, unlike many other business leaders.

I learned firsthand that Communist China responds only to strength, and that is what I will bring if the voters of Pennsylvania send me to Washington on their behalf, by introducing legislation that would:

First, restore American self-sufficiency by helping move medical, pharmaceutical, and other critical supply chains out of China and bringing manufacturing jobs back home to the Commonwealth.

Second, protect American jobs, intellectual property, and values. We must enforce President Trump’s approach of reciprocity in trade and data privacy, blocking Chinese acquisition of U.S. technology, and countering Chinese propaganda, especially on Big Tech platforms.

Third, take the fight to China. Instead of just playing defense, I will push for sanctions on Chinese companies and CCP officials for crimes including stealing our IP, perpetuating genocide in Xinjiang, and covering up COVID, which caused unnecessary death and economic destruction and for which Americans deserve to be fairly compensated.

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Additionally, I will push to create an outbound investment review commission to ensure U.S. investors do not fund China’s military or genocide, whether actively or unwittingly through portfolio investments. And I will demand that China stop fueling America’s opioid epidemic by trafficking fentanyl into the U.S.

And finally, I will ensure America remains the world’s unrivaled military and economic superpower. The competition with China starts at home by winning the race for the technologies of the future, from artificial intelligence to quantum computing, rebuilding our military, and standing up for the American Dream and Pennsylvania values.

I have no doubt we can confront China and win, but we need strong leaders. No other U.S. Senate candidate in Pennsylvania has the experience, knowledge, and determination to make that a reality.

I know from experience what it takes to create good jobs right here in the Commonwealth, to face the Chinese across the negotiating table, and to fight for America.

I’m battle-tested, Pennsylvania true. That’s why I’m running, and that’s how the voters of Pennsylvania can rest assured I will never let them down.

Dave McCormick is a former U.S. Army paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division, a veteran of the first Gulf War, and has been the CEO of two successful businesses. He is currently running as a Republican to represent Pennsylvania in the United States Senate.

Hedge Fund Exec David McCormick Latest To Enter Pennsylvania Senate Race

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David McCormick, here with Donald Trump in 2016, is running for Senate in Pennsylvania. (Photo: Associated Press)

Hedge fund executive David McCormick is the latest Republican to jump into Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate primary, another candidate competing for oxygen in one of the nation’s hottest midterm races.

He confirmed his entry in the race on Twitter Thursday.

“From working on my family’s Christmas tree farm to serving our country in the Persian Gulf War, I have never run from a fight. My next mission: take back our country and bring America First, conservative leadership to the U.S. Senate,” he wrote.

McCormick, who filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission yesterday, stepped down from his role as chief executive at the Connecticut investment firm Bridgewater Associates this month in anticipation of joining the race.

His allies have compared him ideologically to Glenn Youngkin, the private equity executive who won Virginia’s governor’s race last year with a coalition of moderates and Donald Trump supporters.

McCormick joins other wealthy self-funding candidates who have recently lived elsewhere but reestablished residency in the state in order to run for retiring Republican Pat Toomey’s seat. The 56-year-old investment CEO grew up near Wilkes-Barre and recently bought a home in the Pittsburgh area.

In a state Biden won by roughly 1%, Democrats and Republicans are competing for a seat that could determine control of the evenly split Senate, with crowded primaries on both sides. Pennsylvania’s 2022 Senate race is expected to be one of the most competitive in the nation.

A veteran who served as a senior Treasury Department official under President George W. Bush, McCormick isn’t well known outside the finance world, but he has strong connections to former President Donald Trump. His wife, Dina Powell, was Trump’s deputy national security adviser, and McCormick was considered for a Pentagon job under Trump. McCormick has tapped top Trump aides Hope Hicks and Stephen Miller to advise his campaign, Politico reported.

While McCormick didn’t officially announce his candidacy until Thursday, his rivals have been treating him like an opponent for weeks. The Pennsylvania Democratic Party asked federal election officials to look into $2 million in TV ads he placed in the state before declaring his candidacy. A political action committee supporting another Republican in the race, TV host Mehmet Oz, launched an ad attacking McCormick’s ties to China, where Bridgewater Associates manages $5 billon of its $150 billion portfolio.

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Other Republicans in the race include conservative commentator Kathy Barnette, Trump’s former ambassador to Denmark Carla Sands and real estate developer Jeff Bartos, who are each trying to carve out a lane in the race, from decrying “woke” culture to Democrats’ response to the pandemic.

A front-runner has struggled to break out in the field after Trump’s early pick, Sean Parnell, dropped out amid a child custody battle and abuse allegations by his estranged wife, which he denied.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

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