A federal lawsuit threatens to undermine Pa.’s 2024 election

What questions do you have about the 2024 elections? What major issues do you want candidates to address? Let us know.

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.”