PARNELL: Real Questions About Kathy Barnette’s Authenticity as a MAGA Conservative

The following article is sponsored by Dave McCormick for U.S. Senate and authored by Sean Parnell.

In the final weeks of the Senate campaign, Kathy Barnette has taken to campaigning with the phrase, “I am you, Pennsylvania.” But as her candidacy ascends in recent polls, we have to ask ourselves: what do we really know about Kathy Barnette?

Renowned Pennsylvania reporter, Saleno Zito, couldn’t even get basic information out of Barnette and her campaign this week. Barnette’s campaign refused to supply information on when she was accepted into military Officer Candidate School, or when she moved here from Virginia (which she claimed was her residency in a book published in 2020). She refuses to release her DD214 from her time in the Army Reserves.

As a combat veteran, I can say those of us who served may be hesitant to describe the details of our experience, but we are universally proud of our service and willing to answer basic questions about it. She has released her NGB 22 form pertaining to her National Guard service, and I am grateful for that. But she still has not released her DD214 which, up until yesterday, we were led to believe did not exist. She told Chris Stigall on his radio show that she does in fact have a DD214. Why does she refuse to release that, seeming to lead voters away from it? I routinely sent my DD214 to reporters when I ran for Congress and Senate. It is among the most basic documents veteran candidates are asked to produce, but she won’t.

The bio in Ms. Barnette’s book says that she lived in Virginia, which she now says she never did, and that it was a mistake by her publisher. As an author myself, I can’t imagine such an error going unnoticed and uncorrected. She says she has lived in Pennsylvania for nine years but won’t say where she lived before that.

Asking for clarity on these questions is not an “attack.” It’s about as reasonable a request as our current political system will allow. Her refusal to answer them, and her combative tone when asked about them, is what raises concerns. She seems to be trying to run out the clock on those pesky questions ahead of Tuesday’s Primary election.

But perhaps the media knows more than they are letting on, and are just hoping she becomes the nominee so they can pounce. Maybe they see in Ms. Barnette a repeat of Christine O’Donnell, the fatally flawed Republican nominee for Senate in Delaware in 2010, whose candidacy crashed and burned after the press did the vetting primary voters did not.

Ms. O’Donnell will long be remembered for an infamous ad, where her response to criticisms was, “I’m not a witch, I’m you.” Now Ms. Barnette has borrowed that phrase – “I’m you” – and the real question is will she replicate the crash and burn of Christine O’Donnell 12 years later if she gets the nod to take on likely Democrat nominee John Fetterman?

My fellow Pennsylvanians, we can’t risk an unvetted nominee who won’t even answer basic questions about her background, and the little that we do know raises real questions about her authenticity as a MAGA conservative. I know firsthand the lengths the media and the Democrats will go to uncover every detail of a candidate’s life. The issues raised are not from her youth, but from her adulthood. The balance of the Senate runs right through Pennsylvania. Whether or not Joe Biden can count on Chuck Schumer to ram through his agenda will literally be on the line on May 17. We can’t risk this seat on an unvetted, opportunistic candidate whose campaign will crumble when the press begins the real vetting on May 18.

Sean Parnell
Combat veteran and America First supporter
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
@SeanParnellUSA