My Bucks County has been in national news after voters were wrongly turned away after waiting in line for hours for on-demand mail-in ballots. This was a violation of Pennsylvania’s election code. The campaigns of both former President Donald Trump and Senate Candidate Dave McCormick filed complaints, and mail in voting has now been extended.
The Bucks County Sheriff indicated that it was the County Commissioners (led by Diane Marseglia) who “instructed Security to close the lines.”
Commissioner Marseglia has tight connections to a Bucks County race that could decide control of the State House. This, too, should be making national news, as the Keystone State’s House flipped to blue in 2022 for the first time in a decade. For those paying attention, not only is voter access at stake, so is the access of the everyday voter to their government officials as well as Pennsylvania’s fiscal outlook.
The challenger in the state race is Democrat Anna Payne, who is executive assistant to Bucks County Commissioner Diane Marseglia.
Incumbent Rep. Joe Hogan, a Republican, has come out in support of multiple community based issues that cross the aisle, such as early child education, daycare worker retention and improving safety in schools. It is no surprise to see Hogan work on commonsense bipartisan problems: Hogan worked under former Congressman Mike Fitzpatrick. At the top of his website it states that while working for Fitzpatrick, Hogan helped “everyday people get the help they needed.” I can vouch for that personally, having met Hogan while advocating for patients in Fitzpatrick’s office.
Payne does not have such a rosy record of helping everyday people get the help they need. In fact, she has a record while working with Commissioner Marseglia of blocking constituent communications and exaggerating, possibly even lying about the matter.
In early 2022, then Bucks County resident Megan Brock discovered she had been blocked from calling all Bucks County government for a year and a half. Commissioner Marseglia said blocking Brock’s number “was intended to be for only one direct number, from a front-line staff member. ” That staff member was Anna Payne. Payne claimed to have talked with Brock several times, and said she “couldn’t take the extensive verbal abuse anymore.”
Brock contacted Payne at the county’s public number to field constituent concerns, once by voicemail before her number was blocked. After the false accusation of extensive verbal abuse had been publicly leveled at her, Brock obtained her own voicemail from the county and played it at a public meeting to clear her name. The recording cannot be described as ‘abuse.’
Marseglia went on to use taxpayer dollars to sue Brock and constituent Jamie Walker to prevent them from obtaining government records. A judge ordered Marseglia’s obfuscation to be in ‘bad faith’; still she persisted, as Marseglia did not provide all the requested records.
Remarkable. A soccer mom is blocked from contacting local government and she and her fellow soccer mom are blocked from obtaining records that should be transparent.
In healthcare, Anna Payne has proffered some fiscally irresponsible ideas, including advocating against site neutral payments. Currently under the Center for Medicare and Medicaid services, hospitals and the clinics they own get paid many times more than independent healthcare sites. That incentivizes big hospital systems to gobble up even more outpatient centers, creating larger regional monopolies.
Prices are then driven up by these regional monopolies. After a merger, hospitals can jack up their prices anywhere from 3 to 65 percent, according to a Rand review from 2022.
Seniors take note: Enacting site neutral policies, which Ms. Payne is against, can save Medcare $150 billion (with a B) over ten years.
Seniors should also take note that Hogan has a record of protecting them from financial exploitation.
Voters in the Bucks County District where Hogan is challenged by Payne should ask themselves if the assistant to Marseglia is fit for the job of state representative, which requires someone of integrity who can work across the aisle and communicate with a broad array of constituents. Hogan has a proven record of this; Payne does not. Likewise, Hogan has a record of fiscal responsibility while Payne is floating costly misguided policy.
All voters in Pennsylvania, and indeed the nation should be tuning in to what is going on in Bucks County. This election will have consequences. Let’s make sure our voters have a voice in and access to government at all levels. Let’s make sure we are electing officials who can restore the U.S. to fiscal solvency.
