Primary Election April 23, 2024
Plus tomorrow's MontCo Elections Board Meeting and Ongoing UG Public Hearings on Open Space plan
Primary Election to be held Tuesday, April 23, 2024 | Mail-in voting has already begun
The primary election, typically held in May, will be held in April this year because it’s a Presidential election year. This every-four-year primary plan was devised by Gov. Ed Rendell, who was trying to make the Pennsylvania Presidential Primary Election matter more in national politics. The move arguably didn’t accomplish its goal, but did add confusion every 4 years about when the primary is.
Here’s a link to the ballot in this year’s primary. The PA Attorney General’s race is the only one without a candidate endorsed by the MontCo Democratic Party (MCDC.) Here’s a link to the candidates endorsed by the MCDC. These endorsements are determined in February at a convention of all of us committeepeople in Montgomery County. Though frequently the MCDC bigwigs try a bit too much to put their thumb on the scale, this wasn’t one of those elections. I felt good about how the nominating convention was conducted. The article that came out in the Inquirer on May 2, 2023 about internal MCDC favors for cash, plus a group made up of committeepeople who created new MCDC nominating rules, plus a younger Chairman, Jason Salus, has all had an effect.
There are 5 qualified candidates for PA Attorney General. Here are their names and websites:
— Eugene DePasquale for PA Attorney General
— Keir Bradford Grey for PA Attorney General
— Joe Khan for PA Attorney General
— Jared Solomon for PA Attorney General
— Jack Stollsteimer for PA Attorney General
At the nominating convention, no one PA Attorney General candidate received more than 50% of the vote. It’s an “open” primary. I am leaning for Joe Khan but it was a hard choice. To help you make up your mind, here’s a link to a Zoom forum with the candidates.
One note about Gaza — I am unhappy with Biden’s seeming inability to respond to Netenyahu’s moral bankruptcy. War is inhumane and beyond horrible. The response to terrorism is not to become even bigger terrorists. However, Biden is starting to make slow responses to public pressure. Our choice in November is between a man with empathy who listens, if slowly, to the public, and an outrageous liar and malignant narcissist who never, ever listens to the public unless it benefits him personally. I hear Democrats who are unhappy with the choices, but Biden is the incumbent. The way Democratic Party politics works, the nomination was always Biden’s if he chose to run. Please don’t stay home in November! If Trump wins, he has promised to “become a dictator on day one.” We should take Trump at his word.
Montgomery County Board of Elections meets tomorrow - Commissioners are getting hammered by election deniers at these meetings
Please attend Election Board meetings to speak up in favor of our very good Elections Board, for the sake of our Democracy!
I’ve reprinted this article in The Reporter at the bottom of the newsletter, in case you don’t subscribe.
Neil Makhija, a former Elections Law Professor at University of Pennsylvania, and our newly-elected Montgomery County Commissioner, is getting a lot of backlash from election deniers at the public comment time at the meetings of the Elections Board, and at Commissioners’ meetings. According to the article in The Reporter, there seems to be no one there to represent the truth or sanity, otherwise the reporter would have mentioned it. This is really bad for the morale of our new Commissioners, and ultimately wears away at the fabric of our Democracy.
The Elections Board will hold a public meeting tomorrow, Tuesday, April 2nd at 10:00am at One Montgomery Plaza, 425 Swede St, Norristown, PA 19401. You can attend in-person or virtually via Zoom. Please attend these meetings to provide a countervailing narrative to the one posed by the election deniers.
Here’s a calendar for the Commissioners’ public meetings and the Election Board public meetings. New meetings are posted every month. Please keep up with the calendar and attend as many as you can, so that the election deniers who do attend aren’t afforded the luxury of believing that all citizens of Montgomery County agree with them. It’s a big boost to the morale of the public servants trying to do the right thing on your behalf if you make a comment in their support while they are under pressure from these outrageously misinformed people.
Upper Gwynedd Open Space plan survey
If you haven’t done so, it’s not too late to respond to the Upper Gwynedd Commissioners’ Open Space plan survey:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/UGT-CRPOSP-Survey
The next meetings to present a draft plan and solicit public comment are:
Thursday, September 12, 2024, at 6:30PM
Tuesday, October 15, 2024, at 6:30PM (Board of Commissioners Meeting)
Wednesday, December 4, 2024, at 6:30PM
The study to be presented will access and recommend local connectivity improvements to link people to the two planned regional trails – the Liberty Bell Trail and the Powerline Trail – to area parks, residential neighborhoods, places of employment and other local destinations.
The Township has retained Simone Collins Landscape Architecture of Norristown as lead consultant and Derek Dureka, Certified Park and Recreational Professional, to assist the Township in developing this plan.
The 12-month long public planning process will conclude in December 2024. The project is partially funded by a grant from the Community Conservation Partnership Program administered by the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR), Bureau of Recreation and Conservation.
For additional information, please contact Emma Haley, RLA, at Simone Collins Project Manager at 610-239-7601 or ehaley@simonecollins.com.
Election integrity dominates public comment in Montgomery County
Pennsylvania’s primary election is scheduled for Tuesday, April 23
By RACHEL RAVINA | rravina@thereporteronline.com | The Reporter
PUBLISHED: March 29, 2024 at 12:38 p.m. | UPDATED: March 29, 2024 at 12:51 p.m.
NORRISTOWN — Area residents have come out to recent public meetings in Montgomery County expressing concerns about election integrity ahead of the April 23 primary election.
Lengthy public comment periods at recent Montgomery County Board of Commissioners and Board of Election meetings resulted in an airing of grievances and dialogue between elected officials and voters.
“We need election integrity. It’s awful. I just … I can’t,” said Whitpain Township resident Michelle Mellor, adding “This is the most fundamental right that we have is to vote. Can we treat it with the integrity it deserves?”
“Our right is to have a legal and valid voting system, and here in Montgomery County, it is very corrupt,” said Jill Lafferty of Blue Bell.
Montgomery County Election Board Chairman Neil Makhija, a Democrat, maintained that transparency is key to the safety and security of election procedures.
“One of the reasons our elections are secure is because it is the public who votes in any given election. So the record is there,” he said. “So it’s not only capable of being audited by us, it’s capable of being audited by any third-party group.”
“So in your own precinct, you can find out who voted and who didn’t, and that disclosure is one of the reasons that we know that there haven’t been any recent concerns of voter fraud,” he continued.
In addition to overall election integrity, the conversation centered around concerns over election-related fraud. Makhija maintained none has occurred in Montgomery County, but there was some debate among fellow elected officials.
“I just want to say again there’s no instance in Montgomery County of anyone voting who was not supposed to vote, and if anyone has any evidence of that, it can be investigated and prosecuted,” he said.
“I will comment on the fact I wouldn’t necessarily say no fraud has occurred in Montgomery County,” said Republican Montgomery County Commissioner Tom DiBello. “There have been people in the past that have been arrested for fraud in Montgomery County. “So let’s not say there’s never been fraud. In every county, every jurisdiction, there’s fraud somewhere along the line. It happens. The system is not perfect. It’s far from perfect.”
“Me personally, I find fraud to be more of a concern than access because fraud cancels out my vote,” said Worcester Township resident Jim Mollick, who participated in both public comment sessions seeking more information about the signature verification of mail-in ballots and purging voter rolls of those who have died or moved out of the area.
Makhija said procedures surrounding voter roll management are conducted at the state level. Some commenters claimed instances where there were more votes than registered voters.
“Just on your comment of this idea that there were 220,000 more votes cast than people voters,” Makhija said to Mellor. “If you have any information or evidence of that, please send it to me or the district attorney.”
“Will do,” she replied.
Makhija sought to assure area residents of the safety and security of the elections in the state’s third most populous county. However, it appeared people were not convinced.
Upper Providence Township resident Marlene Laska identified herself as someone not confident in the 2020 election results. She addressed Makhija, saying “With all due respect, prove it.”
Mollick shared a similar sentiment to Laska, adding that he found “it hard to believe there hasn’t been any voter fraud in this county.” Echoes of laughter could be heard from the audience as he pressed Makhija, asking “How… you can look at me with a straight face and tell me there’s no voter fraud?”
After some back and forth between the two, Makhija told Mollick “You’re out of time” and said, “if you have the evidence, please bring it.”
“Oh, I will. I did, I gave you some,” Mollick said.
“The evidence of someone actually voting who was not supposed to vote. That’s very different (from) a voter roll, and I’ll tell you why,” Makhija said. “So first of all, in the voter rolls, over 1 million people have been taken off the rolls in recent years in Pennsylvania. They are called all the time regularly, periodically, according to the state statutes. We don’t control those, but they are functioning.”
Makhija went on to stress that “we have a record, a public record, of who voted and who didn’t after every election. So if there’s any question we can go back, and we actually do go back usually in one sense to reward people for having voted a lot, which we’ll do. You should apply for the voter hall of fame, but those are some of the clear measures that we have to secure and make sure the vote is valid.”
Other remarks from residents centered around ballot boxes and voter identification.
“I just feel like we’re going backwards with 24-(hour) ballot (boxes). We’re not in COVID anymore,” Mellor said. “That’s not what made America strong, convenience. Our forefathers would be rolling in their graves. That’s my thoughts.”
Residents also called for county officials to implement mandates that would require people to show identification in order to vote and refuted claims that the policy is “racist.”
“Voter ID, that’s not racist. How did we get that?” Mellor said.
DiBello also offered his thoughts on the matter as he expressed a desire to “find out more” about it.
“For us to sit here in 2024 to sit there and say a voter ID prevents somebody from voting. I mean let’s be real,” DiBello said.
While Makhija noted that “voter ID’s not an issue before us,” DiBello said he does “want to know what we can (do) as a county if there’s anything we can do to put some type of voter ID in place.”
But David Winkler, a Republican congressional candidate running against incumbent Democrat Madeleine Dean, D-4th Dist., used his time to implore elected officials to “make sure we’re listening to the people’s concerns here, and taking it in, and not taking it for granted.” He added that he doesn’t “want anybody disenfranchised this election cycle.”
“I’m a combat veteran. This is something I fought for in the United States,” he said. “I want to make sure that every citizen here has the ability to go down and vote, whether you’re a Democrat, whether you’re an independent, or whether you’re a Republican, that you feel like your vote actually matters and it counts.”
Montgomery County Election Board Vice Chairwoman Jamila Winder, a Democrat, took a moment to respond to Winkler’s words.
“And when you talk about disenfranchised, making sure that everybody has an opportunity to vote, I know that this board is equally supportive of that,” she said. “So thank you for your comments and best of luck.”
As election preparations continue, an agreement between the Montgomery County Office of Voter Services and Collegeville-based PeopleShare LLC, of Collegeville was authorized during a March 7 meeting. The contract, not to exceed $325,000, covered “temporary staffing services required for the 2024 primary election.” Funding was obtained through the county’s general-operational budget.
Residents shared reservations about the cost and purpose associated with the six-figure contract.
“I’d just like to see more oversight and details on this huge expenditure,” said county resident Marilyn Muir.
Montgomery County Chief Operating Officer Lee Soltysiak addressed the matter directly.
“If I could just clarify that very specific question whether or not this contract will be paying for poll workers at the polls, and the answer is it will not,” Soltysiak said.
Around 2,500 poll workers are needed for the upcoming 2024 primary election, according to Makhija. The county had 426 precincts for the 2023 election season.
Pennsylvania’s primary election is scheduled for April 23. Montgomery County voters have until April 8 to register for the primary election and until April 16 to request a mail-in ballot if they choose to vote by mail. The polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Election Day, and all mail-in ballots must be received by 8 p.m. on election night. Visit vote.pa.gov for more information.
As election-related conversation continued leading up to the start of the 2024 election season, Winder sought to set the record straight with constituents.
“I think there’s also a difference between opinions, and questioning integrity, and the processes that we’re working to put in place to ensure that we have election integrity, and I can tell you that this collective board is focused on doing just that and partnering with our director of voter services to ensure that he has the tools and resources to avail himself to deliver on our elections,” Winder said. “And so we might not agree from an opinion perspective on what’s the best decision, but this board cares about integrity, and doing the right thing, and so I want to stress that just from getting to know this team.
The next Montgomery County Board of Elections meeting is scheduled for 10 a.m. on April 2 on the eighth floor of One Montgomery Plaza, 425 Swede St., in Norristown. Visit the Montgomery County Office of Voter Services’ website at montgomerycountypa.gov/VoterServices. Anyone with questions can contact the county’s voter services office by calling 610-278-3280 or via email at MontCoVotes@MontgomeryCountyPA.gov.
Nice work, Faith Keiser! This highlights important, upcoming events that everyone in the area should know about.