HARRISBURG - A series of lawsuits challenging subpoenas issued by the Pennsylvania Senate Intergovernmental Operations Committee will continue, after a ruling today from Commonwealth Court denying “summary relief” to all parties in the litigation. In effect, this means that the court will hear more evidence from the plaintiffs, defendants, and intervenors in the cases before issuing a ruling on the legality of the subpoenas for the personally identifying information of Pennsylvania’s nine million registered voters.
Along with the ACLU Voting Rights Project and the law firm Schnader Harrison Segal & Lewis LLP, the ACLU of Pennsylvania represents eight individual voters and three advocacy organizations - Make The Road Pennsylvania, Common Cause Pa., and the League of Women Voters of Pa. - as intervenors in one of the cases, and the ACLU of Pennsylvania issued a statement in response to the ruling. The following can be attributed to Witold Walczak, legal director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania:
“We are pleased that the personal information of Pennsylvania's nine million voters will not be released as the court continues to weigh the arguments in this case. The parties will now engage in discovery, which will force the Senate committee to be more transparent about what it's doing and why it needs nine million voters’ highly private personal information. Then the court may hold a trial in which experts and witnesses will have the chance to testify.
"Pennsylvania's election administration has been proven effective and secure, and we look forward to continuing to advocate for the rights of our eight voter clients, the three advocacy groups we represent, and all Pennsylvania voters.”
More information about the case, including a copy of today’s order, is available at aclupa.org/Dush.
