President Pro Tempore of the Pennsylvania Senate Jake Corman (R-Centre) celebrated a Commonwealth Court ruling that he said permits a Senate committee to conduct a forensic audit of the 2020 general election and the 2021 primary to subpoena voter records.
“[This] ruling upholds the General Assembly’s clear legal and constitutional authority to provide oversight of our election system,” Corman said in a statement. “Under Sen. Chris Dush’s [R-Jefferson] leadership, the Senate Intergovernmental Operations Committee is conducting this review in a way that is transparent, fair and legally sound, and I am thankful this ruling completely validates our thoughtful approach to this deeply contentious issue.”
The Associated Press reports that the court didn’t block the entire subpoena submitted in September by the Senate committee to state election officials and did not greenlight the release of some information. The court also noted that officials and Democratic lawmakers did not prove the subpoena was without a legitimate legislative purpose, and said it would leave it up to the Senate to determine if the subpoena was appropriately issued under the Senate’s rules.
The case isn’t entirely resolved, a spokesman for the Senate Republicans, Jason Thompson, told Keystone Today.
The court, he said, has asked for additional measures that Envoy Sage, the vendor hired by the Senate Republicans to conduct the investigation, will use to protect the personal information of voters. The Associated Press reports that Envoy Sag was hired on a no-bid contract by Republicans in the Senate and has no experience with elections.
“This means there will most likely be another hearing to cover that issue,” Thompson wrote in an email. “However, that should be the last question the court has to resolve before they make a final ruling on the case.”
The subpoena approved by the Intergovernmental Operations Committee on Sept. 17 was challenged in October by Attorney General Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, who said at the time that “Pennsylvanians’ fundamental rights are under attack.”
“These Senators are using their position of power to demand voters’ personal information, all so that they may continue to lie about our elections,” Shapiro said. “It is time for public officials to move past the Big Lie and to start reminding the public that our elections are accurate, fair, and secure.”
Both Corman and Shapiro are announced candidates for governor.
Many Pennsylvania Republicans are following former President Donald Trump’s baseless allegation that he lost the Keystone State in the 2020 election due to voter fraud. No recount or court case has turned up any such evidence in a state President Joe Biden won by 80,000 votes.
Dush has defended the subpoenas saying that a legal filing notes that the Pennsylvania Department of State provided the same information to the League of Women Voters in 2012 as part of the group’s lawsuit to overturn the state’s voter ID law.
“If they gave that information to a private third party group then, how can they possibly argue against transferring that data to another co-equal branch of government now?” Dush said in a release.
