The Pennsylvania House of Representatives passed a bill that would make it more difficult to challenge election results – but Republican state Rep. Dawn Keefer tells The Federalist “it’s not going anywhere in” the state’s Republican-dominated state Senate. Asked whether the Pennsylvania Senate is likely to pass the bill, state Sen. Majority Leader Joe Pittman’s office did not respond to The Federalist’s request for comment.
Keefer said she “was one of the few that actually challenged” HB 2473 in the House.
The bill passed the state House on July 9 by a margin of 105 to 97, with the support of mostly Democrats and a few Republicans. The bill would limit the window to resolve disputes over election outcomes, with proponents claiming it would keep the certification process in line with federal law.
The Electoral Count Reform Act (ECRA) of 2022 requires that states certify and submit elector slates for the presidential election by Dec. 11, according to the leftist outlet Votebeat. The bill’s requirements would make Pennsylvania’s deadline for contesting the results Dec. 10 this year.
If there are any delays in certifying by the deadline, HB 2473 requires the Pennsylvania secretary to notify state legislators “no later than seven days before” Dec. 10.
Keefer said she was told that if states fail to meet the federal deadline, they risk losing their slates of electors.
“They said the intent [of the federal deadline] is they want to make sure that all the counties and the secretary of states are certifying in a timely manner,” Keefer said.
Keefer said the bill’s proponents claimed the ECRA requires states to certify results by December 11 or risk losing their electors.
“I find that very hard to believe,” Keefer said. “I would love to see how that would actually work constitutionally.”
Keefer also said some advocates of HB 2473 pitched it as ensuring that the secretary of state will finalize Pennsylvania’s slate of electors in time, so if former President Donald Trump wins this November, there is no risk of him losing the electors.
“Let me just challenge this,” Keefer said. “Let’s say Biden wins, then the secretary of state bum rushes to certify. They can run roughshod over the counties. Or they can force the counties to get their data in … and hold money over their heads and other things to force them to comply quicker.”
Allowing the state to rush the process, according to Keefer, would make it more difficult to challenge suspicious election results to ensure an accurate outcome.
“Then we challenge and say, ‘Hey, no no no, everything hasn’t been done. You can’t certify yet,’” Keefer said. “They’ll say, ‘Well, you guys all agreed on this, and now you just don’t like it because you don’t like the results.’”
The bill would require that when a decision by a county board of elections is appealed, courts must “determine the appeal” within seven days, dictating courts give election cases precedence over “other business.”
If a party wanted to challenge a lower court’s decision about presidential election results, under the law there would be a window of one day to appeal to the state Supreme Court. The state Supreme Court must then resolve the matter within six days of the appeal filing or seven days before presidential electors meet, “whichever is earlier.”
Keefer suggested the bill’s attempt “to push the courts” should render it “moot” due to separation of powers.
Powerful Interests
Keefer said the Campaign Legal Center (CLC) backed the bill. According to InfluenceWatch, CLC is an advocacy group that pushes left-wing election interests and whose president, Trevor Potter, gave “expert” testimony to the partisan Jan. 6 Committee. The group claims to have been “heavily involved” in efforts to pass the ECRA.
“I had made some calls trying to figure out where was it coming from and who was helping with it, because it wasn’t something that was brought to my attention,” Keefer said. “That’s when a staffer said, ‘This is an initiative of CLC.’”
CLC has been promoting similar bills across the country. According to documents obtained by The Federalist, on June 4, the CLC-affiliated lobbyist Darren Smith emailed the bill’s sponsor, Democrat state Rep. Benjamin Sanchez.
The email subject line read “ECRA Bill Language,” and attached was a document with file title “Final PA ECRA Language.”
The document, which bears a CLC heading, explains the “problem” that county boards of election currently must suspend election certification while appeals are decided in court. Because courts and appeals are not held to specific deadlines, CLC warns this could cause the counties to miss the federal ECRA deadline.
CLC recommended some “suggested language,” many sections of which appear to have ended up in the bill with only minor changes. The document clarifies four goals for the legislation including, “Supply a deadline for court to decide appeals from board determinations (such as after a recount);” “Supply deadlines for Class II contest procedures;” “Clarify that county boards of election have a non-discretionary duty to certify election results no later than the third Sunday following the election;” and “Provide a deadline by which the Secretary must certify results following the county canvass.”
One recommendation from CLC that didn’t make it into the bill that passed would have decreed that certifying election returns is “a ministerial, nondiscretionary duty” for county election boards, which would have ensured that elected officials who have concerns about the administration or integrity of an election would have no choice but to certify results anyway.
The bill passed the state House on July 9, just five days after CLC sent its recommendations to Sanchez.
The Federalist reached out to Sanchez’s office for comment but did not hear back in time for publication.
