A group of five independent voters including political commentator Michael Smerconish filed a lawsuit Dec. 10 asking a Pennsylvania court to end the commonwealth’s bar against independent voters participating in primary elections.
Secretary of the Commonwealth Al Schmidt certified the results of the Nov. 4 election, which featured a retention vote for three state Supreme Court justices and races for mayor in several of the state’s largest cities, county executives and Philadelphia’s district attorney.
Khan earned approximately 54% of the vote over incumbent Republican DA Jennifer Schorn with all precincts reporting, according to the county's unofficial election results. He ran unopposed in the May 20 primary.
Just after midnight, unofficial results from the county showed Khan leading with 124,624 votes compared to 106,791 votes for Schorn with more than 99% of the precincts reporting.
Justices Christine Donohue, Kevin Dougherty and David Wecht won new terms, with support from the Democratic Party and allies including Planned Parenthood, labor unions, trial lawyers and a constellation of progressive groups.
Nearly 75% of 1.1 million mail-in ballots have been returned in election for judges, local officials.
Pennsylvania voters will decide whether to keep a Democratic majority on the state’s highest court — the center of pivotal fights over voting rights, redistricting and elections — or potentially plunge the court into a partisan deadlock in a premier presidential battleground.
In Pennsylvania, state Supreme Court justices are up for retention vote every 10 years after they are first elected. Instead of pitting candidates against the judges, these retention elections provide a depoliticized way for voters to choose yes or no on whether they want judges to continue serving on the bench for another decade.
The allegations of fraud appeared to be motivated by the defendants' desire to make money and keep their jobs and was not an effort to influence the election results, said Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday, a Republican.
The more than eight million registered voters in Pennsylvania have only a few days left to request a mail-in ballot in time for November's elections.
