DV Journal

(This op-ed first appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)

Elections are always followed by another tradition: finger-pointing season. I’ve spent my entire life in politics right here in western Pennsylvania, which became the looking glass for the entire nation as people tried to figure out what has happened to turn the two parties into battle camps.

Allow me to offer a few things I’ve learned.

Lessons for Republicans

It’s not all about TV. We need to compete with the Democrats in terms of field work. Knocking on doors and asking someone to vote for a candidate remains the most effective way of persuading voters.

Go beyond polling. An era of endless polling has left us with the misimpression that elections are only about reading peoples’ minds. In truth, elections are also about changing peoples’ minds. True, polls tell us what issues resonate with voters, but we need to identify the unarticulated and unfulfilled aspirations of voters. This is a lesson taught in 1991 by the late Harris Wofford who was appointed senator to succeed John Heinz. Wofford’s advisors – chief among them, James Carville – realized that health care for the middle class was increasingly a point of anxiety. Polls had shown that the number one issue identified by voters was jobs – but this will always be the case, just as a sufficient supply of oxygen would trump jobs if you put it on a choice of polling questions. Wofford and Carville recognized that it was the unrealized concerns that mattered. When that case was put to voters in a persuasive way, it allowed Wofford to overcome a political juggernaut known as Dick Thornburgh.

Achievement still matters. Stacy Garrity took the reins at Treasury and immediately laid out a series of goals: return more abandoned property than anyone else, reform how state pensions invest, expand the college savings program. Treasury might be the dullest important job among the statewide, but Stacy showed that a well-articulated record of accomplishment can be an unassailable fortress against political anger ginned up by an opponent. She ended Tuesday night with more votes than any other candidate on the ballot, including Donald Trump, and became the highest vote-getter in modern history, surpassing even Gov. Josh Shapiro. That’s how future stars are made.

Tamp down the anger. Watching television should not induce post-traumatic stress disorder. Bring some joy to the thing. A good lesson here is an ad produced by Pittsburgh’s own ColdSpark media, on behalf of state House candidate Michael Perich. Going up against a well-entrenched and much-liked incumbent, the Perich camp produced “Wrong Way Matzie,” which employed an animated picture of the incumbent flying the wrong way, interspersed with old movie clips and bright music that broke through the angry clutter of other ads and entertained people as well. Perich came within a hair’s breadth of winning and Perich, even in defeat, doesn’t look like just another angry politician. In short: Happy warriors win friends.

Lessons for Democrats

Un-fringe yourselves. Party activists on both sides have traditionally tended to the extremes. This was first noted in 1984 by political scientist Emmett Buell Jr. who saw that candidates for party delegate in New Hampshire weren’t exactly middle-roaders. That has accelerated in both parties, but it is nowhere as vivid as in the exotic assortment of wailers, cause-finders and all-around scolds that now steers the party of JFK and Truman. This has been made all the uglier by the emergence of a brand of antisemitism that hinges on the notion that Israel is an imposition on the Middle East rather than a refuge for persecuted Jews who practice democracy. Here in Allegheny County, the largest city is run by a cadre of leftists incapable of balancing the books, and the county council is a haven for loud extremists, some of them so supportive of the poor that they would make more of them by taxing the middle-class into poverty. Nationally, the Democrats have chosen to politicize things that should not be political and taken the tar brush to people who are religious or just out of step with the current fashion. Think about this: the Catholic vote used to be reliably Democratic. This year, the only Catholic on the national ballot was JD Vance.

Take off the robes and mortarboard. Class in this nation was once defined by income. Today, class is just as readily identified by educational attainment. A conservative university professor is a museum-quality find. This correlation between university degree and liberal politics is not a result of one causing the other. It is a result of one group taking over academia and turning it into a place where dissent is strongly encouraged, but only so long as it conforms with the liberal orthodoxies of the academy. I have news for them: a boilermaker, welder or truck-driver will soon be the only middle-class wage-earner able to send their child to college without amassing debt. Self-aggrandizing piety is pretty much the only luxury still available to the overburdened university student. Democrats need more than universities to promote their message and that means not just listening to non-college voters. It means taking them seriously.

The Gender Gap runs both ways. The press has long focused on the leftward political drift of women and suggested that this means there’s something wrong with the Republicans. A bit of introspection would help here. Men voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump, much as they have for other Republicans. That’s a gender gap, too. And it’s not going to be solved by explaining away differences of opinion with terms like “toxic masculinity” or, my favorite, “mansplaining,” which has come to mean any unwelcome opinion from a male. Figure out why men aren’t voting for your party. I’d venture to say that it’s because, increasingly, they don’t feel welcome.

I close in noting that every election carries its own, sometimes unique, lessons. There is one that stands out this year: when it comes to the people, the system works. Now, it’s up to the people they elevated to make things work as well.

After a hearing on Friday, Delaware County Common Pleas Judge John J. Whelan dismissed a lawsuit over voting machines brought by a Republican congressional candidate and others.

Alfeia Goodwin is challenging three-term Democratic incumbent Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon.

“The judge’s decision was anticipated, and we’re appealing,” Goodwin told DVJournal.

The suit claimed the 18 Hart Verity voting machines in question should be quarantined and the FBI should be called in to investigate who installed the rogue software, the lawsuit says. Also, the county’s other 838 machines should be tested to see if they have the same issues.

Goodwin’s co-plaintiff, Robert Mancini, a computer cyber-security expert, said MathNET Numerics Dll, a program not authorized by state or federal elections officials, was found on the machines. He warned the county council about the MathNET program at its April 17 meeting before the state primary.  The county took no action to remove it, he said.

The county welcomed the court’s decision, according to a press release.

“The court’s ruling, issued after a thorough five-hour hearing, confirmed that the Bureau of Elections and Voting Machine Warehouse had fully complied with regulations and conducted additional testing that exceeded state requirements,” county officials said.

At the close of the hearing, Whelan said the county’s performance of testing beyond what the state requires weighed in the ruling. He stated the evidence suggests Delaware County voters should feel confident in their election systems.

“This decision confirms what we have said all along: our voting equipment is secure, reliable, and compliant with both federal and state standards,” said Delaware County Elections Director Jim Allen. “The thoroughness of our Logic and Accuracy testing demonstrates our commitment to fair elections. We encourage voters to participate in the upcoming election with full confidence that every vote will be counted accurately and transparently.”

He called the claims made in the lawsuit “baseless.”

“The county’s Logic and Accuracy testing—a vital component of election preparation—ensures that all voting machines function correctly and match the certified software. In addition to pre-election testing, the county conducts a test to verify that the software in use perfectly matches the software that was certified by the federal government. The election offices also perform post-election audits and recounts, including hand recounts, to further verify the accuracy and reliability of election results.

The lawsuit sought emergency relief, claiming improper software had been installed on the county’s voting machines. However, the plaintiffs failed to provide evidence of these claims, county officials said.

Mancini said, “Judge Whelan does not understand that software not verified by the EAC is not allowed on Electronic Voting Systems. Defendant Delaware County successfully conflated the difference between loading software and validating that the software matches the original build that was tested in an accredited lab by the Election Assistance Commission.

“The judge ruled that non-technical people can make a technical decision,” he added. “Not a single witness knew what the output a ‘trusted build validation’ or what a hash code is ! The judge allowed software that has not been tested, verified and validated on the scanner, a software package that is designed specifically to manipulate date because it was too much work to count the ballot by hand.”

Pennsylvania’s elections are safe and secure, featuring tried-and-tested systems that are proven to protect the vote and ensure accuracy in the results. Still, with Nov. 5 barely a month away, some voters are concerned about how our elections are run. They shouldn’t be.

I’ve had a front-row seat to plenty of elections. As Pennsylvania’s top executive, I worked directly with our Department of State to safeguard the built-in processes that protect the integrity of the system. As a Bucks County commissioner, I served as a member of the county’s Board of Elections, where I had a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into protecting your vote. The process is rigorous.

I’m confident in the safeguards in place, and you should be, too.

The commonwealth has implemented a range of measures to ensure that every aspect of election administration, from voter registration to logic and accuracy testing to the certification of results is both safe and secure.

One of the joys of campaigning for office and serving in an elected post is all the people you meet. That’s especially true on election day. That’s when you meet the true champions of democracy.

Statewide, Pennsylvania utilizes about 45,000 poll workers to staff 9,000 voting locations. These dedicated friends, neighbors and co-workers undergo rigorous training to become experts on the rules and laws of the election process.

Local election officials and poll workers put in long hours on election day to ensure everything runs as planned. It takes tens of thousands of everyday Pennsylvanians – people from both parties – to make sure our elections run smoothly.

They did it in April during the primary election – and every election before that – and they will do it again in November during the general election.

Another reason our elections work so well is because transparency is a key part of the process, and anyone can witness it by serving as a poll worker for the county or as a poll watcher for their parties or candidates of choice.

Seeing really is believing.

And there is a lot to see in how our elections are run. For most voters, though, their only experience is going to the polls to cast their ballots.

If we want voters to be confident in how Pennsylvania’s elections are run and how the votes are counted, then it’s up to us to give them a behind-the-scenes look at the many systems in place that safeguard the electoral process and protect their vote.

It starts before election day, with public testing of voting machines and systems. All 67 counties in the commonwealth conduct pre-election logic and accuracy testing. These stress tests ensure the integrity of ballots, scanners, ballot-marking devices, and all components of a county’s certified voting system.

It happens on election day, too, when those trained workers confirm voter eligibility and identity when ballots are cast. And it continues after the election has ended, when people are brought in from all political parties to observe the vote-counting process.

The reality is our elections have many built-in processes for verification and review before, during and after a vote is cast.

Ballots from election day and the mail are verified and counted, ensuring eligibility and accuracy every step of the way. Officials carefully follow these legal procedures to ensure exactly one vote per one eligible voter is counted. The final vote count is audited twice to confirm accuracy. Local election vote counts are publicized and certified in public meetings, which you can attend yourself.

These checks and balances happen in every election in Pennsylvania so we can rest assured that votes are cast fairly and counted correctly.

For those of us involved in civic engagement, we all want the same thing: We want voters to participate confidently in the electoral process.

By encouraging voters to learn more about how our elections work, we can come together on election day and trust that the results have been delivered fairly and accurately.

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(This article first appeared in Broad + Liberty.)

Delaware County election board member John McBlain has resigned, accusing the panel of rushing to add three “voter service centers” in deeply Democratic parts of the suburban Philadelphia county, something he said adds a blatant element of unfairness to the county’s election process.

McBlain, the lone Republican on Delaware County’s election board, has been the minority party appointee on the three-member election board since 2021. All members of the election board are appointed by the county council, which has been majority-Democratic since early 2020. A provision in the county’s charter ensures a check on the majority party, however, requiring that at least one member of the election board be a representative of the minority party.

At a special meeting of the election board on Friday, McBlain announced his intention to quit effective at the end of November, saying his decision was due to the board’s approval of three voter service centers in Upper Darby, Chester, and Chester Heights — all three Democratic strongholds.

“I thought I could serve on this board as long as I believed that we were making sure the elections were both secure and fair,” McBlain began at the end of the meeting on Friday, October 11. “I think the board has put their finger on the scale, so I don’t think that that fairness aspect is there anymore. Therefore, I — as much as I’m tempted to do it, as of effective immediately — I tender my resignation as of November 30th, 2024, so that I’ll complete my duties during the election certification process. But then I hereby resign from the board after that date.”

Voter service centers (VSCs) are essentially no different than “satellite election offices” which were controversial as far back as the 2020 general election. Whichever name is used, the creation is meant to be a literal extension of the county’s primary election office — the one place where a voter could register to vote, request a mail-in ballot, and return that ballot, all at the same time and same place. Philadelphia’s satellite election offices drew the ire of Republicans that year because Philadelphia refused to allow poll watchers anywhere inside, arguing that the locations were county election offices, so they could not be polling places. A Commonwealth Court ruling later upheld that argument to exclude poll watchers.

Like Philadelphia, Delaware County also used satellite election offices in 2020, the rationale largely being the pandemic. But according to McBlain, since 2020 “the only voter service center that we’ve maintained has been [the original and main election office] at the Media courthouse, and we’ve done that for each election, and that has been adequate.”

Now, McBlain says, the three VSCs seem to be created spur of the moment, and they’re in some of the deepest blue parts of the county.

“I don’t understand what has changed. We are down — I want to say by more than a third, if not two thirds — the number of applications for mail-in votes as we were in 2020,” McBlain said.

“There’s no more pandemic where we need to sort of spread things out. There’s not a need for it. The Media [county seat] office is more than adequately handling all requests for registration for applications to handle receipt of mail-in or absentee ballots,” McBlain told Broad + Liberty after his resignation. “No one has been calling publicly for [VSCs]. I don’t recall one member of the public attending a previous meeting this year [prior to Oct. 11] and advocating that we ought to have voter service centers for better service to the residents.”

In the September 24 meeting of the election board, county election director Jim Allen distinctly raised the possibility of adding VSCs, and listed only the sites of Upper Darby, Chester, and Chester Heights as possibilities.

But it’s what happened next that troubled McBlain the most.

McBlain says just after that meeting, he was talking to Allen. Then Donna Cantor, who McBlain says is a lawyer for the county Democratic party, approached them both.

“She [Cantor] came up to Mr. Allen and said to him that Colleen Guiney, the chairwoman of the [county] Democratic Party, had the list of volunteers to staff the voter services center ready. And I expressed shock,” McBlain said.

“I said, ‘I didn’t realize that we had decided that we were going to have voter services centers.’ And to Jim Allen’s credit, I mean, he immediately said ‘Well, listen at any voter services centers, we’re not going to have partisan volunteers staffing.’ But the Democratic Party was already prepared to staff these voter services centers at the September meeting where again, it was discussed almost in passing,” McBlain explained.

Election Director Allen did not directly refute that a conversation with Cantor happened, but he did offer his own context.

“[S]omeone approached me about the possible use of volunteers, in front of Mr. McBlain, and I turned away the suggestion. There were no specifics or a ‘list,’” he said.

Cantor did not respond to a request for comment asking if she disputed McBlain’s version of the conversation.

Guiney responded to a request for comment, but did not answer specific questions about whether the county Democrats were somehow prepared to staff VSCs before the VSCs were even discussed publicly and approved. Guiney mostly filibustered.

“It is a matter of public record that voter services centers are located in areas convenient to public transit, and in facilities already wired into the secure Delaware County communications system,” Guiney said. “We have had Voter Service Centers in previous elections, and surrounding counties have already opened Voter Service Centers this cycle. This matter has already been discussed on the publicly streamed Board of Elections leading up to the most recent meeting.

“The Democratic party has robust volunteer engagement, but the County is not using volunteers in the Voter Service Centers. Any Delaware County resident, of any political party is welcome to apply for a temporary position with the Board of Elections by contacting the Bureau of Elections for more information,” Guiney concluded.

For the public comment portion of the Oct. 11 special meeting, 21 total people rose to address the election board. A Broad + Liberty analysis showed five of them spoke about regular polling locations, one spoke about poll worker safety, thirteen spoke in favor of adding VSCs, and two expressed concerns about VSCs.

“So at the time of the [Oct. 11] meeting, it was clear that there was a partisan [effort] to pack the room in favor of this. There were dozens of Democratic committee people or volunteers,” McBlain said. “There were a dozen or more members of the League of Women voters who were nothing more than the provisional wing of the Delaware County Democratic Party who were present to speak in favor of it.”

A request for comment to the two other members of the election board, sent to them via the county’s spokesperson, was not returned.

Democratic State Representative and chair of the Upper Darby Democratic committee Heather Boyd was among the thirteen who spoke in favor of the measure. Others included a county Democratic committee member, someone that ran for delegate to the Democratic National Convention last May, as well as a donor to a local Democratic candidate, and the founder of a progressive group in Delco. Two persons from the League of Women Voters also spoke.

One Drexel Hill resident questioned the rationale of the satellite site locations. “I’m also concerned about the equity of these polling places, these satellite polling places. Where is the equity for the communities that have heavy Republican presence? Where is their pop-up satellite location [in] communities such as Parkside, Trainer, and Upland — communities that are also considered perhaps low income communities, where is their pop-up voting site?”

McBlain also said VSCs came up very briefly but somewhat unseriously months ago, he suggested the county survey all municipalities to see which ones might be interested, but that the county never acted on that suggestion.

To anyone thinking McBlain has a hair trigger for an election conspiracy need only listen to his Democrat counterparts to understand that’s not the case.

“I think you served the board with great distinction,” Election Board Chairwoman Ashley Lunkenheimer said upon hearing McBlain’s intention to resign. “I think there’s very few in the county or in the commonwealth who have a better knowledge of election law and I think that your viewpoint has always been well served on this board, but I appreciate that you’re continuing your duties than through the election because we need — you have a really good perspective on elections.”

“John McBlain is someone who I’m gonna disagree with on a great many policy issues, but we both have the same factual understanding of how elections are conducted,” Democratic Councilwoman Christine Reuther told the Inquirer in November, when Reuther was about to renominate him to the election board. “He doesn’t see conspiracy theories every time you turn around.”

Reuther’s November comments to the Inquirer came just as a long-simmering partisan power struggle over the election board was about to come to a close. Earlier in the year, the county council passed an ordinance that would allow it to reject the minority party’s nomination for the election board. The resolution went further, saying that the county had the “unfettered discretion” to reject as many candidates from the minority party as it liked until it found a suitable candidate.

Council Democrats passed the ordinance in January of 2023. Republicans quickly denounced the move as a power grab. When Republicans sued in June, a spokesperson for the council accused Delco Republicans of playing politics.

“Interestingly, the Delco GOP public statements on this case suggests [sic] a ‘blatant power grab,’” the county said in a statement to the Delco Daily Times. “However, the change in law which is being challenged was passed on January 17, 2023. Now, more than five months later, has the lawsuit [sic] been filed. It appears less an effort to secure a fair election, and more a weak effort to develop a talking point for an upcoming county election.”

However, a judge ruled in December the ordinance was illegal and struck it down.

“The Ordinance was an arrogant attempt by County Council to create a veto power for themselves to block the right of the Delaware County Republican Party Chairman to nominate his preferred member to the Delaware County Board of Elections,” said Wally Zimolong, one of the attorneys who fought the suit on behalf of the county GOP.

Reuther, the member of council who oversees the county’s elections, has also danced on the partisan tightrope in a presidential election before.

In 2020, Reuther was clearly the lead on the county’s pursuit of and eventual acceptance of election grants from the Chicago-based Center for Tech and Civic Life, or CTCL. Those grants would later be famous for receiving a $350 million infusion from Mark Zuckerberg

As Delaware County got nearer to accepting the grant, the county solicitor flagged to Reuther some of the left-leaning tendencies of the granting agency.

“Not at all surprising,” Reuther said in response. “I am seeking funds to fairly and safely administer the election so everyone legally registered to vote can do so and have their votes count. If a left leaning public charity wants to further my objective, I am good with it. I will deal with the blow back.”

The Pennsylvania General Assembly later banned local election offices from accepting grants from outside, private agencies, in part because of the concerns that the grants resulted in improper and unbalanced political influence.

McBlain was not a part of the election board at that time.

But this time, he says it’s not election security he’s worried about.

“I think this is the Delaware County Democratic Party putting their hand on the scale with these voter services centers to literally get out the vote in highly partisan areas of the county without any consideration of [if] there’s a reason that they didn’t come in and offer it in Marple or Springfield. So I just wasn’t going to be part of it anymore. I’m disgusted with this partisanship showing its head at the 11th hour.”

Ever since the election failures of 2020, Pennsylvania has been working to address the shortcomings in our state election law.

Through the work of Republicans in the Pennsylvania General Assembly, over the last four years, we have passed legislation that better funds county election administration while providing quicker and more accurate election reporting.

Thanks to those efforts over the last several election cycles, we have reduced wait times for election results and mail-in ballots are often the first reported election results on election night, rather than waiting days for those results to be processed.

Unfortunately, Democrats in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives recently passed legislation along party lines that would take a step backward and return us to the days of not having election results on Election Day. This same bill would allow counties to count mail-in ballots after Election Day, which would inject more questions into ongoing concerns about the integrity of our elections.

In the legislation, House Bill 847, which passed with only support of Pennsylvania House Democrats, counties would be afforded additional time to pre-canvass mail-in ballots. While this is an election reform that has been asked for by election administrators, it is not something the public has widely supported when asked about needed election reforms.

In fact, it is a change that would only make the act of government easier for the government itself and does nothing to improve trust and confidence in the outcome of our elections.

If the legislation stopped there, it would be merely a solution in search of a problem. The calls for additional pre-canvassing time harken back to the early days of no-excuse absentee voting in Pennsylvania, which occurred during the pandemic. That unique set of facts at the time caused an over-reliance on a newly expanded voting option in Pennsylvania.

However, in the years since, counties have been able to adapt, more people have returned to voting in-person, and new legal requirements and additional funding have ensured counties process ballots quickly and accurately.

But in addition to addressing this unnecessary pre-canvassing change, House Bill 847 goes a step further by removing the current requirement that counties begin pre-canvassing at 7 a.m. on Election Day and that they cannot stop counting until all votes are counted.

That means while counties are afforded the opportunity for additional pre-canvassing time, they are also given the option of counting mail-in ballots after Election Day and are not required to provide election results under any specific timeline other than the required certification date.

As a result, some counties may take days after Election Day to process mail-in ballots and delay the announcement of results.

This will surely only add to existing suspicions and questions about our elections.

In what is sure to be an election year with many contested races from president down to the General Assembly, adding questions and suspicion back into the process to achieve an election reform that is not widely supported and is objectively unnecessary is the kind of legislation we should avoid.

Meanwhile, the same Democrats continue to bottle up popular election security reforms that would continue Pennsylvania on a path of increased trust and satisfaction with the election process.

A constitutional amendment that would require Pennsylvanians to show identification each time they vote has been bottled up in a Democratic-controlled committee for over a year.

After House Republicans moved forward with an effort to try to get this amendment out of committee, 100 members—from both sides of the aisle—signed on to the petition to make that happen. But Democrat-crafted House operating rules continue to allow this bill to sit stagnant, despite almost half of the entire Pennsylvania House of Representatives supporting it.

And that flies in the face of public opinion. Last month, a poll by Franklin & Marshall College found that 73 percent of Pennsylvanians support requiring voters to show identification each time they vote. The same poll found that only 50 percent of Pennsylvanians support additional pre-canvassing time.

With 100 signatures on the voter identification constitutional amendment discharge petition, it is clear House Democrats need to get out of their own way and put up this easily achievable, and highly popular, election reform for a vote in the House.

Just months away from a national election where Pennsylvania will again play center stage let’s get politics out of the way, let’s stop passing “talking points legislation” that makes government better for government, and let’s start putting the people of this Commonwealth first by doing what they believe will increase election confidence instead of adding more questions into the process.

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(This article first appeared in Broad + Liberty.)

A relatively new nonprofit that orchestrated the distribution of grants to county election offices all across Pennsylvania in the runup to the 2020 presidential vote has recently made donations to Democratic-aligned political action committees, further undercutting the organization’s own claims it is nonpartisan.

The revelations shed more light on a nonprofit that, while launched in the Trump era, has remained active and has hosted voter registration parties in Bucks County in advance of Tuesday’s special election for House District 140. Those parties have included live bands with giveaways like free coffee and funnel cakes, and “amazing prizes like couches and coolers!”

According to its website, “The Voter Project is a non-partisan, non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring all Pennsylvania voters can cast a ballot in a safe, secure, and convenient way.” The project is organized as a 501(c)4, meaning it is a nonprofit, but it can engage in certain activities that a 501(c)3 could not.

The Voter Project’s disclosures with the IRS show a $35,000 donation to Agenda PAC in late October, 2022. It was the second largest donation Agenda PAC received in the federal reporting cycle from 2021-22, representing about fifteen percent of Agenda PACs total fundraising haul in that same period.

Agenda PAC, meanwhile, spent between $9,000 to $11,500 on Youtube ads promoting the Democratic slates of candidates in the 2023 school board races in Pennridge and Central Bucks, according to Youtube’s library of political advertisements purchased on its platform.

In at least two of those Youtube ads, the narrator chastises the Central Bucks School Board, only to end with a graphic that promotes the slate of candidates in Pennridge, offering no explanation as to why the CBSD’s actions should influence the Pennridge races.

Agenda PAC also spent $100,000 in support of Sen. John Fetterman’s campaign.

Agenda PAC has come under recent scrutiny after a Daily Caller article revealed that the PAC, chaired by hasn’t filed any campaign finance reports for 2023.

The Voter Project, meanwhile, has recently become its own 501(c)4, but started off as a project of the Keystone Research Center, a left-of-center Harrisburg think tank.

The Voter Project and its board president, Kevin Mack, were instrumental in distributing election grants to counties in the runup to the 2020 by a Chicago-based nonprofit, the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL).

After Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan gave $350 million to the CTCL in September of 2020, Republicans alleged the project was a Trojan Horse to increase turnout in heavily Democratic districts and dubbed the entire project “Zuckerbucks.”

A Broad + Liberty analysis from 2021 showed the grants distributed in Pennsylvania that year were in fact heavily skewed towards “blue” voting counties like Philadelphia, Allegheny, Delaware, and Centre.

Although the CTCL never responded to any inquiries from Broad + Liberty, it has generally countered these claims by saying that after the Zuckerberg grants were received, the CTCL transitioned the grants from invitation only to an open call. Therefore, CTCL has argued that Republican-leaning counties that received small awards nevertheless largely received 100 percent of their grant request.

While that may be true, it is also true that many of the Democratic counties in Pennsylvania that received large awards were given those grants prior to the open call — a time when “red” counties had no means at all of applying for or receiving the grants.

Before the “open call” portion of the granting process, The Voter Project and the CTCL worked exclusively with blue counties for grant awards, with the lone exception of Republican-leaning Bucks County. In that instance, then-Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar personally reached out to Bucks County commissioners to see if they would be interested in taking a grant. Boockvar has never explained why she was authorized to reach out to Bucks County to make the invitation, or why Bucks County was chosen at a time when other counties were shut out.

Months after the 2020 election, Mack, whose main job is as a partner for a political-mail consulting agency in Washington D.C., wrote on his corporate biography page that he had “served as Lead Strategist for The Voter Project in Pennsylvania which was instrumental in signing up over 3.2 million people to vote by mail and leading the soft-side effort to win the swing state in 2020,” (emphasis added).

Mack’s employment with the D.C.-based firm Deliver Strategies has also played a prominent role in how The Voter Project has spent its money. According to the most recent IRS 990 form for The Voter Project, it spent $4.3 million with Deliver Strategies.

On the same form, the nonprofit addressed any potential ethical concerns by saying, “This was an arms-length vendor relationship and The Voter Project relied on outside individuals and organizations to advise on overall spending, budgets and fees for services.”

Mack’s partner at Deliver Strategies, Fiona Conroy, is a director at a 501(c)4 political nonprofit called Project Keystone, which is a polling consortium for Democratic candidates and causes.

In addition to giving the $35,000 to Agenda PAC, The Voter Project has also given grants to two D.C.-based organizations, Pennsylvania Progress, and Pennsylvania Forward. Those two political nonprofits share the same principal officer and address. While Pennsylvania Progress’ mission statement is to “PROVIDE NONPARTISAN VOTE BY MAIL EDUCATION IN PENNSYLVANIA” the mission statement for Pennsylvania Forward is “TO ADVOCATE FOR PROGRESSIVE POLICIES IN PENNSYLVANIA[.]”

The Voter Project’s 990 does not indicate any grants to any organizations that could arguably be characterized as right of center.

Deliver Strategies no longer publishes work biographies of its employees, nor of its extensive client list, which is exclusively Democratic candidates and left-of-center organizations, such as unions.

Mack did not return a request for comment on donations made by The Voter Project.

Almost any election is, by nature, a referendum on the incumbent. But the 2024 presidential election has two incumbents of sorts.

Incumbents generally have an automatic name recognition and fund-raising advantage. However, a challenger can triumph if the contest is about the incumbent’s shortcomings, Swiss political consultant Louis Perron explains in his new book “Beat the Incumbent: Proven Strategies and Tactics to Win Elections.”

President Biden is the actual incumbent going into a likely 2020 rematch with predecessor Donald Trump, who has been a de facto incumbent in the primary season, maintaining an overwhelming lead over Republican contenders.

“Every election is different, but every election is the same,” said Perron, who has advised campaigns in the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Romania, Ukraine, Malaysia and the Philippines, ranging from mayoral to presidential candidates. “Candidates used to argue over opinions; now they argue over facts. But the basics of elections never change. Candidates have to have a strong message and good crisis management.”

He noted the two previous U.S. incumbents — Barack Obama and George W. Bush — mastered this in dispatching their challengers, John Kerry and Mitt Romney.

“Elections are naturally a referendum on the incumbent, but the challenger has to keep it as a referendum on the incumbent,” who earned a master’s degree in political management from George Washington University and a doctorate from the University of Zurich. “An incumbent has to be brutal and do damage to the challenger as Bush did and as Obama did.”

The book asserts the recommendations are applicable across various countries and political offices.

It also describes how Obama’s first campaign in 2008 painted opponent John McCain as a Republican insider tied to an unpopular incumbent as McCain tried to sell a maverick image; how Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky managed to win a landslide despite being a first-time candidate for office; and how François Hollande never let the pressure off incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy in winning the French presidency.

In laying out a blueprint, it would seem to have some similarities with the famous Allan Lichtman book “Keys to the Presidency,” which lays out a specific formula to predict which candidate wins. But the Perron book is also a how-to manual, rooted in history and political science, with chapter titles such as “The Secrets of Selling Change,” “The Best Challenger Campaign Messaging Ever,” and concluding with “Final Word and Checklist.”

After Iowa, GOP candidates learned the insurmountable difficulty of beating a de facto incumbent, but polls have shown New Hampshire is closer, depending on which poll you read.

“One reason Nikki Haley is a safer choice for Republicans in New Hampshire is because a challenger is better positioned if the election is a referendum on the incumbent,” he said.

He anticipates Trump will close the deal on the Republican nomination with a New Hampshire victory. However, New Hampshire might not hold the final say. He points to the 1976 Republican presidential primary as an example where a challenger can gain momentum late. In that case, former California Gov. Ronald Reagan challenged President Gerald Ford.

“Ford ultimately won, but it was very close,” he said. “What’s so surprising about 1976 is how long it took Reagan to catch steam. But once he did, he won a string of primary victories.”

In 1976, Ford won in Iowa, New Hampshire and four more contests and appeared likely to cruise to the nomination. Then Reagan turned the tide by winning North Carolina and several other states. The contest went back and forth, and it was a contested Republican National Convention, where Ford prevailed.

Still, the historical anomaly could prompt either Haley, a former United Nations ambassador, to hold out hope of unseating the quasi-incumbent Trump.

In a general election, Trump and Biden are so disliked that the “double haters” could decide the outcome, Perron said.

“If the focus is on Trump, Biden will win. If the focus is on Biden, Trump will win,” he said.

As we end the year and the 2022 election cycle, it is important that we look back at the most important lessons and takeaways.  The next election is never too far away, and 2022 can teach us a lot of what success looks like for the Republican Party here in Southeast Pennsylvania in 2023.

First, let’s look at the results here in Bucks County. After years of failing to beat our Republican state representatives and senators at the ballot box, Democrats took it upon themselves to try and beat us through the redistricting process. The maps they produced were a blatant partisan power grab.

Despite the best efforts of Harrisburg Democrats, Bucks County elected five Republican state representatives and two Republican state senators this year.  This represents a critical voting bloc in a Pennsylvania House which, as I write this, is under Democratic control by just a single seat. Maintaining this presence for our party in the House is just one of the keys to judging our success in 2022.

This success was due in no small part thanks to the next topic I’d like to discuss, which is candidate quality. This election proved that after all this time, candidate quality is still an absolutely crucial factor in a campaign’s success. Here in Bucks County, we were proud to have a wonderful slate of candidates up and down the ballot, who worked hard and fought every day to represent our community and its values.

When the new Pennsylvania House and Senate and U.S. Congress are sworn in, Bucks County will be home to the majority of Republican state representatives and senators in our region, and the only Republican congressman to represent the Delaware Valley.  This is thanks in part to the quality of men and women who go out and make their case to their neighbors on behalf of themselves and the party.

The final important lesson we must take away from 2022, and one that I am hopeful we as a party are quickly learning, is the clear need to make better use of early voting. While I would like to see Act 77 repealed as much as the next person, we must recognize that early voting is not going away any time soon.

For too long, too many in our party refused to make use of early voting, whether in person at your local Board of Elections office, or by mail. Democrats start with hundreds of thousands of votes in the bank, and we spend just one day playing catch up. Here in Bucks County, we started an early vote program back in 2021, and have seen great success. It’s time to expand that across the Commonwealth.

As we all prepare for our county and local elections in 2023, we cannot soon forget the lessons from both our successes and failures in 2022. We know what we must do to win, and we are fired up and ready to go in the new year.

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I hope you will indulge me for just a few moments to make a couple of other recommendations. I have got one for my Republican colleagues; I have got one for my Democratic colleagues—mostly for my Democratic colleagues— and two for this institution that we have had this privilege to serve in.

For my Republican colleagues, let me just say, our party can’t be about or beholden to any one man. We are much bigger than that. Our party is much bigger than that. We are the political representation of this huge center-right coalition across America. On a good day, that is more than half of Americans.

And I hope we resist the temptation to adopt the protectionist, nativist, isolationist, redistributive policies that some are suggesting we embrace. I think those are inconsistent with the core values of a majority of the people in this coalition. More importantly, I think those ideas lead to bad outcomes for our country.

For my Democratic colleagues, I have heard many of you passionately— and I believe sincerely—declare your determination to defend our democracy, but I would suggest we all remember that democracy requires much more than the ease of voting in an election.

Elections are absolutely necessary, but they are an insufficient condition for a truly democratic society. Elections really are a means to an end; they are not the end themselves. The end, or purpose, of elections is to provide the mechanism of account ability of the government to the people whose consent is our sole source of legitimacy.

When we hand over Congress’s responsibilities to unelected and, therefore, unaccountable parts of our government—be that the courts or independent regulators or executive branch agencies—we really undermine our democracy, which, of course, is really our Republic, because we weaken the accountability of our government.

Now, look, both sides have done this over time, but I would just hope we could all agree that preserving more responsibility and, therefore, accountability for the legislative branch of government is a good thing for our Republic.

And then two suggestions for this amazing, historic institution. The first one—and it is the most important one: Please keep the filibuster. It is the only mechanism that forces bipartisan consensus. It prevents government governance from the extremes. By forcing bipartisanship, it results in more durable legislation and so lessens the likelihood of big swings in policies. It provides stability for our constituents. And if you want to see more polarization, get rid of the filibuster and we will have much more polarization.

The second thought I had that I wanted to share with you is, I think we can all agree that the Senate has not been functioning as well as it once did and as it really should. I don’t think too many committees are producing too much legislation the old-fashioned way. The old-fashioned way was actually a pretty good vetting process for developing legislative ideas. And when legislation does get to the floor, typi- cally, there are very few substantive amendments that are allowed to be considered.

The result is, as a body, it is very difficult for us to discover whether and where there might be a consensus. I know there are a lot of reasons for this, including political polarization, reasons why the Senate behaves in a way that tends to block debate and voting.

But there might be some relatively modest tweaks in Senate rules that might just facilitate restoring some of what used to be normal functioning. I know a lot of you have done a lot of work in this and that work is still underway. Let me suggest you considerone small tweak, a small but important technical change to a rule, the rule which enables the obstruction of the body.

I am not talking about the filibuster but, rather, the rule that effectively requires unanimous consent, in most cases, to allow a vote on an amendment, any amendment, even a germane amendment.

I can tell you, most Pennsylvanians are very surprised to learn that in order for a Senator to get a vote on almost anything, he or she needs the permission of every other Senator. I don’t think this rule is workable any longer, and it contributes to the dysfunction.

So I have just got a simple idea: Consider raising the threshold for blocking an amendment to some number greater than one.

Now, I support the filibuster because I think it is reasonable for 41 Senators to be able to block legislation. It just doesn’t seem reasonable for one. So I don’t know what the right number is, and I am not religious about this. Maybe it is 10. Maybe it is 20. Maybe it is 50. But I would just suggest that this body consider somehow raising the bar of preventing the Senate from functioning. There may be better ways to do it, but that is one suggestion.

Let me conclude with this: You know, we have all inherited something really, really, truly special. I know we all appreciate that, the fact that we live in the greatest country in the history of humanity and that we serve in this amazing legislative body.

I suspect we all get asked—I know I get asked from time to time—some version of the question: How worried are you about our country’s future?  And, often, there is some combination of national security, political polarization, and the future of our economy that is the primary concern of the people posing the question.

My short reply is usually: Look, we have gotten through much tougher times. But think about it. I think that is so true, and it is important to remember.

On national security, we have got real threats out there. Russia is obviously led by a violent, dangerous bully. The Chinese Communist Party is a rising and increasingly aggressive threat. But nowhere do we face the imminent threats that we faced during World War II and at several moments during the Cold War.

And we are polarized, and it is uncomfortable and it is problematic; but, in 1968, we had political assassinationsand cities were being burned down. And this Chamber, this very Chamber we are in right now, first opened its doors in 1859. Imagine living through the decade that followed that.

As for the economy, look, there are always risks to any economy. Ours is no exception. I think inflation is a significant problem. There is a possibility we have a recession next year. We have huge and growing national debt, and I think that is going to be a real challenge for us.

But I think it is worth remembering this: The vast majority of Americans have a much higher standard of living today than our parents did when they were our age. And a rising standard of living is, after all, the purpose of economic growth.

So I always answer that question about America’s future with the truth, and that is that, despite our challenges, I am extremely bullish on America. And I think my optimism is easily justified by our history.

America has always been able to survive and thrive, and America remains the greatest nation in the history of the world. If we keep on being Americans, we will remain the greatest nation on the planet.

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Many Americans will spend October stoking fear and building tension, with no shortage of blood-curdling screams. Then there’s Halloween.

Over two years, more than $9 billion will be spent on Election 2022. Money will be thrown at Americans to get them to choose between political candidates and parties, just like it will be spent on Marvel costumes, candy corn and the rest. Between the midterm elections and Halloween celebrations, U.S. spending will total upward of $20 billion, dominating public discourse.

While Halloween spending is driven by market demand and impervious to criticism (as it should be), election-related spending drives some people crazy. Spending money to promote your ideas is far scarier than Halloween to those whose ideas your particular spending may oppose.

Campaign finance “reform” is now a priority of the Democratic Party, with End Citizens United spokesman Adam Bozzi claiming “it’s both good policy and good politics.” (Side note: End Citizens United, as a nonprofit organization, does not disclose its donors.)

The left’s insistence on shutting down free speech and free association is strangely obsessive when it comes to politics. It seems like only speech and association that has to do with the electoral system and the democratic process are worth condemning, despite the fact that they form the very foundations of our democracy.

What is democracy but your freedom to organize and communicate on behalf of your ideas? And yes, meaningful communication requires spending money — something Democrats have no problem with so long as their ideas are communicated.

But, as long as you’re not spending money on politics, it’s quite all right. And, yes, a Marvel Halloween is quite all right. Consumerism is a good thing, just like money in politics is a good thing. In fact, American politics needs more money in it, not less, because political spending is associated with the free flow of ideas. It reflects public discourse in the idea marketplace, with the most popular ones (like Marvel) dominating the discourse while the least popular ones (sorry Green Lantern) ultimately fade away. Similarly, candy choices with the most appeal attract the most consumer dollars, while the organic alternatives get thrown away.

That’s the whole point. The market is the ultimate freedom: Taking the product of your own hard work (or that of your parents) and spending it on whatever ideas — or candy — you may choose.  In politics, good ideas attract money, just like sugary candy attracts the most kids.

Winning candidates and political parties draw attention from donors large and small. Of course, losing ones (i.e., Michael Bloomberg) can flood the political system with billions of dollars, but money is no guarantee of victory. Bloomberg knows that better than most, and plenty of candy ideas are just as flawed. But some people liked Bloomberg, and the “top 10 worst candies ever” list is admittedly rife with my childhood favorites!

So why shouldn’t we be free to choose, in any marketplace, what’s right for us?

No amount of money will get Americans to embrace ideas that aren’t actually popular, just like you can’t pay me enough to eat Hot Tamales for Halloween.

The amount of money in politics is a barometer of civic engagement writ large, and civic engagement is inherently beneficial to democracy. A democratic system can’t function without it. The more money spent, the more people are engaged, and the more ideas compete to curry favor in the marketplace. Like in the U.S. economy and on candy shelves, competition leads to greater consumer choice and personal freedom.

Here’s a tip leading to Election Day: Don’t listen to those crying wolf about political spending. Keep dressing up as Spiderman, keep eating your Skittles, and keep contributing to American democracy.

Free speech and free association are every bit as sweet as candy corn.

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