McCormick Concedes to Oz in Pennsylvania GOP Senate Primary

HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania — Former hedge fund chief executive David McCormick conceded the Republican Senate primary in Pennsylvania to celebrity heart surgeon Dr. Mehmet Oz, ending his campaign Friday night as he acknowledged an ongoing statewide recount wouldn’t give him enough votes to make up the deficit.Mr. McCormick said he had called Dr. Oz to concede.“It’s now clear to me with the recount now largely complete that we have a nominee,” Mr. McCormick said at a campaign party at a Pittsburgh hotel.He added, “Tonight is really about us all coming together.”Before the recount, Dr. Oz led Mr. McCormick by 972 votes out of 1.34 million votes counted in the May 17 primary. The Associated Press has not declared a winner in the race because an automatic recount is underway and the margin between the two candidates is just 0.07 percentage points.Friday’s development sets up a general election between Dr. Oz, who was endorsed by President Trump, and Democrat John Fetterman in what is expected to be one of the nation’s premier Senate contests.The result could help determine control of the closely divided chamber, and Democrats view it as perhaps their best opportunity to pick up a seat in the race to replace the retiring two-term Republican, Senator Toomey.Fetterman, the state’s lieutenant governor, acknowledged earlier Friday in a statement that he nearly died when he suffered a stroke just days before his primary. He said he had ignored warning signs for years and a doctor’s advice to take blood thinners.Dr. Oz, who is best known as the host of daytime TV’s “The Dr. Oz Show,” had to overcome millions of dollars in attack ads and misgivings among hard-line Trump backers about his conservative credentials on guns, abortion, transgender rights and other core Republican issues.The 61-year-old Dr. Oz leaned on Mr. Trump’s endorsement as proof of his conservative bona fides, while Mr. Trump attacked Dr. Oz’s rivals and maintained that Dr. Oz has the best chance of winning in November in the presidential battleground state.Rivals made Dr. Oz’s dual citizenship in Turkey an issue in the race. If elected, Dr. Oz would be the nation’s first Muslim senator.Born in the United States, Dr. Oz served in Turkey’s military and voted in its 2018 election. Dr. Oz said he would renounce his Turkish citizenship if he won the November election, and he accused Mr. McCormick of making “bigoted” attacks.Dr. Oz and Mr. McCormick blanketed state airwaves with political ads for months, spending millions of their own money. Virtually unknown to voters four months ago, Mr. McCormick had to introduce himself to voters, and he mined Dr. Oz’s long record as a public figure for material in attack ads. He got help from a super PAC supporting him that spent $20 million.Like Mr. McCormick, Dr. Oz moved from out of state to run in Pennsylvania.Dr. Oz, a Harvard graduate, New York Times bestselling author and self-styled wellness advocate, lived for the past couple of decades in a mansion in Cliffside Park, New Jersey, above the Hudson River overlooking Manhattan — drawing accusations of being a carpetbagger and political tourist.The celebrity heart surgeon stressed his connections to Pennsylvania, saying he grew up just over the state border in Delaware, went to medical school in Philadelphia and married a Pennsylvania native.Before he ran, Mr. McCormick was something of a celebrity on Wall Street, running the world’s largest hedge fund, and had strong Republican Party establishment ties going back to his service in President George W. Bush’s administration. His wife, Dina Powell, was a deputy national security adviser to Trump and had strong party connections as well.

McCormick Concedes to Oz in Pennsylvania GOP Senate Primary

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