Josh Shapiro Makes Excuses For Counties Counting Invalid Ballots

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro lied about election law on Monday night to try to excuse the behavior of Democrat election commissioners who expressly stated their intent to violate the law and flout the state Supreme Court when they decided to count invalid ballots.

Bucks County was one of several counties that decided to count mail-in ballots that were misdated or undated despite the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling those ballots were not to be counted under state law.

The decision set off a flurry of lawsuits by Republicans. Rather than act swiftly to uphold the rule of law and integrity of the election, Shapiro waited days to release a statement about the decision of Democrats to count invalid ballots to try to sway the race for incumbent Sen. Bob Casey, who lost re-election to Sen.-elect Dave McCormick.

“As counties continued counting ballots from the 2024 general election and a mandatory statewide recount begins in the U.S. Senate race, they were confronted with a lack of legal clarity surrounding undated mail-in ballots that caused significant confusion and put counties in a challenging legal position,” Shapiro said in a statement.

“Given this lack of clarity, county officials in each of our 67 counties were damned if they did and damned if they didn’t — likely facing legal action no matter which decision they made on counting,” Shapiro continued.

But there was no “lack of clarity.” In fact, Bucks County Commissioner Diane Ellis-Marseglia admitted such on Thursday when she declared she would willfully violate the law because “precedent by a court doesn’t matter anymore” and because she wanted “a court to pay attention to it.”

What part about her statement indicated to Shapiro that she was confused about where the law stood?

The truth is Shapiro knew that Ellis-Marseglia was clear on the law. It’s exactly why he waited four days to speak up. If Shapiro was the “moderate” Democrat that the left wants Republicans to believe he is, he would’ve condemned the blatant violation of state law and a clear court ruling on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. Instead he sat on his hands hoping the Pennsylvania Supreme Court might somehow side with Democrats (shocker, they did not).

But Shapiro’s delay wasn’t just a political misstep — it was an admission that he was more concerned about protecting his party’s interests rather than protecting the integrity of the election process. Shapiro waited to see if the courts were going to bail out the Democrats.

Shapiro’s weak, gaslighting, and misleading days-late statement wasn’t just a failure of leadership — it is a betrayal of the trust that voters place in their elected officials to follow the law and protect the electoral process.