By now, many of us are aware that State Senator Doug Mastriano has threatened to subpoena all of the machinery and records connected with the 2020 Presidential election in three counties: Philadelphia, Tioga, and York. All of them rejected his request to voluntarily relinquish these materials.
Although the York County commissioners demurred on the matter, that did not stop a large group of protesters from voicing their disapproval of the commissioners at a commission meeting in late July.
What makes many of us scratch our heads over this incident is that Republicans are supposed to be fiscal conservatives, with an eye upon weeding out waste in government. Yet this group, which has been articulating the Republican mantra about election fraud since 2020, is willing to allow a firm unauthorized in the handling of such election apparatus, to inspect these voting machines, even though two previous audits found no problems with the 2020 election. The Secretary of State has already decertified the machinery in Fulton County over an unauthorized audit, which will cost the county millions of dollars.
Yet another group of residents from Berks County has been upset with their county commissioners. Like the little girls in Madeline who wanted their “appendix out too”, these residents were begging their commissioners to have an audit like Philadelphia and the other counties.
While the county commissioner meetings have been somewhat amusing, some of the recent school board meetings have been downright frightening. Hecklers in the Havertown School District have tried to suppress speakers for expressing support of vaccinations and opposition to structural racism in the curriculum and practices of the district. Meanwhile, members of Reopen Bucks and Parents Have the Right to Know shouted obscenities and death threats at a medical professional who had been invited to speak at a meeting of the Central Bucks School Board last month. Her testimony concerned the employment of information from authoritative sources in addressing issues concerning COVID-19.
These incidents are not anomalies, but are emblematic of how the aftershocks of January 6, have resonated at the local level.
The problem for Democrats is that these deniers of slavery, racism, COVID-19, and January 6 are currently more visible than progressives. We need to turn that scenario on its head. There are important races coming up for school boards and municipal governments in November. Of particular importance are the races for judges to the Supreme Court, Superior Court, and Commonwealth Courts. We need to speak up at meetings. We need to write letters, and op-eds, and most important is to get out and canvass. If you can’t canvass, make telephone calls.