Judges consider nominating petition challenges
A Fayette County judge has ruled on the objection to the nominating petition of one candidate for prothonotary on Monday, while the fate of two other candidates’ petitions remains to be decided.
Robert Ted Pritchard of Fairchance, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for prothonotary in the May primary, filed objections to all three of his competitors’ nominating petitions. Judge Steve P. Leskinen has denied the objection seeking to strike Nina Capuzzi-Frankhouser from the ballot.
Pritchard originally filed objections to the other three candidates’ petitions in a singular document, which President Judge John F. Wagner Jr. severed last week before scheduling a hearing for the objection against Pamela Hudson’s petition. Pritchard then asked the court if he could proceed in forma pauperis, or as a pauper, to avoid paying separate $85.75 fees to file the other two objections.
Pritchard paid the other two filing fees Monday morning in the prothonotary’s office, and Leskinen, having received advanced notice that Pritchard would be making the necessary payments, agreed to review Pritchard’s objections to Capuzzi-Frankhouser’s petition, pointing out that a hearing was not required under the provisions of the election code.
In his opinion and order, Leskinen outlined his guiding principles in reviewing Pritchard’s concerns, specifically noting that the election code must be “liberally construed to protect a candidate’s right to run for office and the voters’ right to elect the candidate of their choice.”
Leskinen also pointed out that before he could declare any candidate’s petition invalid, “there must be evidence that the candidate knowingly falsified the affidavit with intent to deceive the electorate.”
The issues Pritchard raised regarding irregularities in the nominating petition were amendable, Leskinen wrote. Addressing the objections Pritchard raised to the signatures Capuzzi-Frankhouser collected, Leskinen said Pritchard needed to be specific about the alleged defects and state reasons for objections to each signature, noting that the court’s presumption is that they are valid unless Pritchard could prove otherwise.
Leskinen allowed Capuzzi-Frankhouser to amend some of the irregularities in instances where it was possible to make corrections on the forms, such as filling in page numbers where they were not consecutively numbered.
The judge did strike one nominating petition containing 40 signatures in its entirety because the candidate’s affidavit on that page was not notarized or signed by the candidate. Leskinen pointed out that Pritchard listed 85 signatures to be challenged, and although the judge overruled those objections because Pritchard failed to specify the challenges, the total number of valid signatures remaining would be more than enough to satisfy the requirement that a candidate gather at least 125 signatures to appear on the ballot.
Pritchard said he would appeal Leskinen’s decision to Commonwealth Court.
A hearing was held before Wagner regarding the objection to Hudson’s nominating petition, in which Pritchard objected to an ethics statement as well as all of the signatures Hudson submitted.
Pritchard called Larry Blosser, elections bureau director, to the stand and asked if Blosser had reviewed all 371 of Hudson’s signatures. Blosser said he understood he was only required to review the signatures Pritchard questioned in the original objection he filed, not a general inquiry into all the signatures. Of the signatures Pritchard specifically asked Blosser to review, most of them were challenged either on the basis that the people used abbreviations such as “B.V.” for Belle Vernon or “C’ville” for Connellsville, or that the people signed their names where they should have printed them, and vice versa.
Pritchard asked for some of the individual sheets of signatures to be thrown out because the notaries’ signatures were obscured by their official stamps.
Hudson told the court, “I never falsified anything.”
“We are honest, good people,” Hudson said.
Wagner said he would rule on the objection expeditiously.
Outside the courtroom, Hudson’s campaign manager, Bill Jordan of Uniontown, said, “What he said about Pam being deceitful is just ridiculous.”
Pritchard said he has nothing personal against any of the other candidates.
“I want to ensure the integrity of the electoral process and nomination petition circulation process,” said Pritchard.
Senior Judge Gerald R. Solomon is reviewing Pritchard’s objection to Paul Shipley’s petition. Monday would have been the last day to schedule a hearing on the matter, but the judge has until Wednesday to make a ruling.