Penn Capital-Star: Pa. Court rules state House special elections will be held on Feb. 7
By Harrison Cann and Justin Sweitzer
Amid the uncertainty in the state House, Pennsylvanians got a bit of clarity Friday when a court ordered two special elections for vacant state House seats to be held on Feb. 7. As a result of the Commonwealth Court’s Friday ruling, three special elections to fill vacancies in the state House will be held on Feb. 7, as the court sided with House Democratic Leader Joanna McClinton over House Republican Leader Bryan Cutler, whose challenge was rejected.
In a three-page order, the court said Cutler failed to prove that he will suffer “immediate and irreparable harm” without an injunction from the court.
“Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court today decided to ignore basic math and prior law in ordering all three of these elections be held together on Feb. 7,” Cutler said in a statement. “Instead of resolving a dispute where the answer was self-evident based on the numbers, the court took the path of least resistance and thereby weakened the foundations of our republic and faith in the rule of law.”
Nicole Reigelman, a spokesperson for the House Democratic Caucus, said in a statement that the decision “is good news for the nearly 200,000 Allegheny County residents currently without representation in the state House.” “Now county elections officials can proceed to print ballots and make final preparations for special elections in the 32nd, 34th, and 35th legislative districts on February 7,” Reigelman said.
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https://www.penncapital-star.com/government-politics/pa-court-rules-state-house-special-elections-will-be-held-on-feb-7/
Good!
Cutler is an ass and won't give up his now-lost power. They are trying hard to get their draconian abortion ban and voter suppression amendments on the ballot for a referendum, as this session would have been the 2nd consecutive needed to make it so. But with Democrats narrowly taking control of the state House, hopefully that is DOA, which is why the loons in the state Senate attempted to slide those asinine amendments onto a package with a "need-to-pass" amendment to extend the statute of limitations for sex abuse victims.
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Yes these are 3 blue seats in a blue county, but still!
Everything got stalled when asshole Brian Cutler tried to delay the special election until next May.
All for his own selfish purposes.
When you draw the lines FAIRLY you get FAIR representation, which is something we haven't had at the state level in 10 years, and we only recently achieved it for congressional districts in 2018 (reaffirmed in 2020) thanks to successful court cases by Democrats (where a previous trifecta including the courts, were not going to do it). Change the dynamics of governor and the state Supreme Court and voila!
Am hoping the next go-around we can flip some Senate seats and build the House ones. 
Look what happened when the map was redrawn for U.S. Congressional Districts in 2018. Our state maps didn't get approved until 4 years later. What a difference those maps made! Especially for the House.
