Republican state Rep. Valerie Gaydos is set to serve a fourth term as representative from Pennsylvania’s 44th House District, unofficial results show.
Gaydos and her opponent, Democrat Hadley Haas, both came into the general election out of uncontested primaries.
Haas, 53, of Bell Acres, was running a campaign to shore up Democrats’ majority in Harrisburg. Gaydos has represented the district since 2018, the latest in a line of Republicans who have won the district since 1997.
With all precincts reporting, Gaydos appears to have won with 53.84%, to Haas’s 46.05%.
The state 44th House District encompasses several of Pittsburgh’s western suburbs, including Sewickley, Moon Township, North Fayette Township and other surrounding communities.
Gaydos, 57, of Sewickley, has deep roots in the 44th District. She grew up locally, and her father was a local dentist. As a high school student, she became a certified EMT and volunteered with Valley Ambulance. After high school, she went on to graduate from Dickinson College in 1989.
As an adult, she worked for U.S. Sen. John Heinz and then became a successful small business owner. She founded Capital Growth Inc. in 1994, a “venture capital information and data publishing company.” She was also a top angel investor who founded the Angel Investor Forum.
She moved back to the area to be a caretaker to her ailing mother, and she lost her husband to lung cancer in 2002.
Gaydos’s business background has informed her career in Harrisburg thus far. She has prioritized making Pennsylvania more attractive to businesses, and in turn, bringing more and better jobs to the area.
In addition to those issues, she also wishes to focus on lowering taxes, ensuring better government efficiency and working across the aisle to accomplish legislative goals.
In 2022, Gaydos won the seat with 54% of the vote, beating out Democrat Debra Turici.