Pennsylvania's Republican Party will feature Donald Trump as the guest at a New York City fundraiser, but it is not necessarily an endorsement from the party elite after Trump's controversial comments about Muslims.
The billionaire real-estate mogul and presidential candidate is doing well in polling and the party's donors would like to hear from him at the $1,000-a-head Commonwealth Club luncheon Friday, Pennsylvania GOP Chairman Rob Gleason said. The invitation is not an endorsement by the state party, Gleason said, but it could encourage more than 300 to show up at the Plaza Hotel event.
Beforehand, Trump will appear at a $2,500-a-person VIP photo reception.
Trump made worldwide headlines and caught the ire of political opponents -- including Democratic Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter -- for the presidential candidate's proposal to ban Muslims from the United States.
It's one of the many festivities surrounding the annual Pennsylvania Society dinner that typically draws thousands from the state's political and business establishments. Last year's keynote speaker was former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and the year before that was New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, one of Trump's rivals for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination.
Lancaster County's Republican chairman, David Dumeyer, said many GOP voters want to hear out Trump as they make up their minds. It is difficult to say whether Trump can capture Pennsylvania in the April 26 primary election, and there is concern over Trump's attention to detail and the way he expresses his views, Dumeyer said.
"I'm not sure he necessarily plays well with the establishment, but he seems to have a lot of grass roots support," Dumeyer said. Still, he said, "I haven't heard anybody say I absolutely won't vote for him."
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Val DiGiorgio, chairman of the Chester County Republican Party, is supporting Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. DiGiorgio said Trump's support emanates from anti-establishment, anti-Washington voters and he can only envision Trump winning the Pennsylvania primary in a broad field of candidates where 25- to 30-percent of the vote is enough.
"As the field winnows down and you get down to one anti-establishment candidate and one what I'll call a more conventional candidate, and as people tend to get more serious about who's going to be president, I think that Trump will not carry Pennsylvania," DiGiorgio said.
Jim Roddey, chairman of the Allegheny County GOP, does not support Trump.
"I don't think he's qualified," Roddey told the Post-Gazette. "I think people, in the final analysis, will realize he doesn't have the skills, the background and the experience he needs to be president."
Still, Roddey told the Tribune-Review of Pittsburgh, "he's colorful and a lot of people will come just to hear him talk, even if they anticipate he might say something crazy."
The party said it will spend the proceeds to help re-elect U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey and to increase the number of Republicans in Pennsylvania's U.S. House delegation and state Legislature.
One of the Democrats running to challenge Toomey in next year's election responded by making Trump's invitation the basis for a fundraising appeal.
In an email missive Monday, Katie McGinty's campaign said Trump "has spent the last six months insulting women and minorities" and that worried Republicans are running to trump after Democrats swept five statewide judicial elections last month.
