Gotta love this! Republican Pat Meehan is running for Joe Sestak’s 7th District seat in the Philly suburbs. Meehan, a former U.S. attorney, is of course running on his law-and-order record (don’t look too closely, now!). Of course, since so many of our state judges are bought and paid for, I wouldn’t expect them to rock this particular boat:
The nominating petitions that Republican Pat Meehan’s congressional campaign submitted to get on the May primary ballot are so rife with invalid signatures and outright fraud as to warrant keeping the former U.S. Attorney off the ballot, according to a complaint filed in Commonwealth Court.
The 15-page complaint, filed by Republican supporters of Meehan’s likely Democratic opponent Bryan Lentz, details a litany of problems with the more than 3,600 signatures collected by Meehan’s campaign, as well as with the petitions on which they were gathered. If even a fraction of the allegations prove to be true, it will cast significant doubt on Meehan’s comments last week implying that the problems were limited to signatures gathered by one just one person. Lentz’s campaign also spurred ballot challenges against both of his underdog primary opponents, E. Teresa Touey and Gail Conner, in a move that could leave him unopposed in May but could also run the risk of alienating some Democratic women (a Women for Lentz fundraiser is scheduled for Thursday evening).
It was unclear Wednesday night when court hearings for any of the challenges would take place.
The complaint, which is being handled by prominent election lawyer Clifford Levine, alleges that an examination of Meehan’s nominating petitions reveals “a wide-ranging and extensive pattern of false and forged entries, entries obtained through deception of Signers, and whole pages of outright forged signatures.” The complaint is the culmination of a several-days long effort by Lentz campaign staffers, during which they pored through Meehan’s nominating petitions and contacted people whose signatures they now believe were forged. Though Lentz cannot personally be the one challenging Meehan’s ballot position—the law requires the challenge come from a registered Republican—his campaign has made no effort to hide its fingerprints on on the complaint.
“This challenge will demonstrate that the instances of forgery and fraud in Meehan’s petitions extend far beyond what Meehan and his organization were willing to admit in their confession to the district attorney last week,” Lentz campaign manager Vincent Rongione said.
