Pennsylvania
A federal lawsuit threatens to undermine Pa.’s 2024 election
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A federal lawsuit aimed at Pennsylvania’s voting system threatens to undermine the 2024 election long before a ballot has been cast.
The Missouri-based United Sovereign Americans, alongside a trio of Chester County and Delaware County voters, alleges Pennsylvania failed to meet federal elections standards in 2022 and that those mistakes could be repeated in the upcoming cycle.
Bruce Castor Jr., attorney for the petitioners, said Pennsylvania is surpassing the “error rates” allowed under federal law.
“The whole idea here is to ask the federal court to order the various people who are responsible for enforcing election laws to see that the 2024 and subsequent federal elections are followed out within congressionally mandated guidelines,” Castor said.
The petitioners in the lawsuit, which was first reported by LancasterOnline, used their own calculation to determine their conclusions — a calculation that legal experts have deemed unreliable.
“It relies on their own data analysis, which has been shown — the analysis of these particular plaintiffs — to be completely faulty and discredited,” said Marian Schneider, senior policy counsel for voting rights with the ACLU of Pennsylvania.
She said the complaint demonstrates a “complete lack of understanding” of the federal statute and that “it’s attempting to undermine the 2024 election before it happens.”
“People are setting up this characterization of Pennsylvania election administration that they can point to after they don’t get the result they want in November, and that really upends the tradition of democracy in our country,” Schneider said.
The Pennsylvania Department of State is one of nine defendants listed in the legal complaint. Matt Heckel, spokesperson for the Department of State, categorized the lawsuit as unmerited.
“A review shows it to be a frivolous action alleging, without any supporting facts or viable legal theories, a panoply of conspiracy claims advanced by litigants who have repeatedly filed baseless actions rejected by the courts,” Heckel said. “Undeterred, these litigants and their counsel continue to waste taxpayer money.”
Pennsylvania
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Pennsylvania
What the war with Iran could mean for gas prices in western Pennsylvania
The war with Iran could start impacting your wallet as soon as today.
Jim Garrity from AAA East Central says oil prices are up.
“They’re hovering around $72. They were pretty consistently around $65, $66 for a while,” he said.
Nationally, AAA said the average for a gallon of regular sits at about $3, up approximately six cents from last week.
In Pennsylvania, it’s around $3.12 a gallon, and in the Pittsburgh region, it’s around $3.24 a gallon. That’s actually down about four cents from last week.
Garrity added that gas prices this time of year would already be increasing, usually because of higher demand for the warmer months and the production of the summer blend of gas used for those months.
The impacts of what’s happening in Iran may not be immediate, which could be part of why our region and the state overall have not seen a spike yet, he said.
“It could be a couple of days later. It could be up to a week later,” Garrity said.
A lot of people are watching what happens with the Strait of Hormuz. Iran borders it to the north, and 20% of the world’s oil goes through it.
Iran is one of the world’s biggest oil producers, and China gets a lot of that oil.
“If there is an impact there, you could see oil start to come in from other parts of the world, which has a downstream effect on [the United States],” Garrity said.
One way you can save on gas if prices increase in our area is by slowing down.
“When you drive faster every five miles, over 50 miles an hour, your fuel efficiency is going down,” Garrity said. “You’re making the car work harder, making the gasoline consumption less effective.”
Garrity added that in 2022, when our area and many others saw some of the highest gas prices ever recorded, people changed their driving habits.
“We saw people make seemingly permanent changes to their driving behaviors, driving less in general, consolidating trips,” he said.
Pennsylvania
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