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HARRISBURG — Pennsylvania will need to spend at least $5.4 billion to close the gap between rich and poor school districts, according to a long-awaited report approved by a divided panel of policymakers Thursday.

The report was backed by Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration and won near-unanimous support from legislative Democrats who served on the Basic Education Funding Commission.

It recommended changing the formula Pennsylvania uses to fund public schools to reduce year-over-year fluctuations in poorer districts’ state funding, while also calling for increased investments in school construction and an expansion of the education workforce.

It passed the commission 8-7.

“I think we’ve at least laid out a blueprint now, where within five years … we’ll be able to say we have or have not made progress, and here’s what we need to continue to do,” said state Rep. Mike Sturla, D-Lancaster, who co-chaired the commission.

The Basic Education Funding Commission — which consisted of six Democratic legislators, six Republican legislators, and three members of the Shapiro administration — was reconvened last spring to address a landmark state court ruling that found Pennsylvania is unconstitutionally underfunding poor school districts.

Any change to the way the commonwealth funds education will need to win support from the Democrat-controlled state House, Republican-controlled state Senate, and Shapiro, a Democrat.

Alongside the Democratic-authored report that passed the commission, Republicans authored their own. It failed to pass in a 6-6-3 vote, with Shapiro’s representatives abstaining.

Common ground exists. Both major parties agree the state must rewrite its education formula to stabilize poorer districts’ annual funding. Policymakers in both parties also agreed that all 500 districts should receive at least as much state funding as they did in the 2023-24 fiscal year, which would prevent deep funding cuts in districts currently losing population.

Both reports also highlight school construction, teacher recruitment, and reforms to charter school payments as areas of agreement.

But in a divided General Assembly, the increased spending favored by Democrats who control the state House will likely require policy concessions to appease the state Senate. The Republicans who control that chamber support alternatives to public schools, including a taxpayer-funded voucher program.

Threading the needle between the two stances will require compromise, which has been elusive in the past year.

Adequate funding, or student choice?

In the Democratic-authored report that ultimately passed, lawmakers based their $5.4 billion goal for new spending on “adequacy targets” — the bar at which they believe districts are serving students at an acceptable level.

This measure sets a baseline amount of per-student spending, then adds in additional spending based on a district’s student body and factors like poverty and level of English proficiency. If a district spends less than the resulting number, it is missing its adequacy target, the report said.

Commission members wrote in the Democratic report that this measure was drafted in response to feedback during hearings across the commonwealth.

“Many criticisms of the current formula centered around the idea that it allocates what is available instead of determining what is needed to meet the needs of districts,” the authors wrote.

They added, “Out of PA’s 500 school districts, 387, or 77%, have an adequacy gap.”

In addition to the proposed $5.4 billion infusion — which would be doled out to districts over seven years — the report says the state should implement a mandatory, annual $200 million increase in school funding to account for cost increases. While education funding has routinely increased in recent budget deals, the exact number has been the subject of backroom haggling between top policymakers, which creates more uncertainty for districts.

Where to find the money to fund increased state spending remains an open question — and a top GOP concern.

Some public education advocates, including leaders of a major state union, want to tap the state’s now-flush rainy day fund, sitting at about $6 billion.

“We have the means and responsibility to give our students and educators the world class education system they deserve right now,” Arthur Steinberg, president of the Pennsylvania chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, said in a statement Thursday. The union represents educators and other support staff in urban districts.

Dan Urevick-Ackelsberg — an attorney with the Public Interest Law Center, which represented plaintiffs in the initial school funding case — said the fact that the Democratic proposal includes a concrete funding target is a big deal.

“The timeline is very long and the number is lower than we proposed,” he said. “We’ll try to convince the governor to get that number up, but we also know this is a really serious, meaningful first step.”

Republicans’ plan mirrored Democrats’ in that it adjusted the funding formula to protect shrinking and poor districts from big funding shifts.

However, legislative Republicans said they did not want to suggest a dollar amount, arguing instead that the number should be decided during budget negotiations later this year.

“Never have you seen this commission — or for that fact, really any other commission — offer that specific dollar recommendation,” said state Sen. Kristin Phillips-Hill, R-York, the Republican co-chair of the commission, after Thursday’s meeting. “We respect the General Assembly, the governor, and the process and believe that we will see this come to fruition in the next budget process.”

The Republican-introduced report that failed to pass the commission called for lowering pension costs, consolidating districts to reduce duplicative costs, and creating a taxpayer-funded voucher program to cover private school tuition for students in public districts with low test scores.

“Comprehensive solutions, not funding alone, are required to ensure all school districts have the resources necessary to supply students with comprehensive learning opportunities that meet 21st century academic, civic, and social demands,” the GOP report stated.

The more GOP recommendations that are adopted in a final deal, “the easier some of the other conversations around the dollars will become,” said state Rep. Jesse Topper, R-Bedford, the ranking Republican on the state House Education Committee.

The next steps are in the hands of Shapiro, who will deliver his annual budget address in a little less than a month.

Members of the administration are “the ones that are going to be making a budget proposal here soon,” Sturla said. “They’re the ones who are going to be pushing part of this. They’re one of the biggest seats at the table.”

In a statement Thursday, Shapiro said he looked forward to his speech as a starting point, noting the report included a number of his priorities, such as increased spending on mental health and school construction.

“We must approach this responsibility with hope and ambition — because this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to do right by our kids, to fund our schools, and to empower parents to put their kids in the best position for them to succeed,” he said.

‘Thorough and efficient’

The Pennsylvania Constitution requires the General Assembly to “provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public education to serve the needs of the Commonwealth.”

In a lawsuit filed by the Philadelphia-based Education Law Center and Public Interest Law Center almost a decade ago, six districts argued the state’s formula for funding schools failed to meet that standard and discriminated against students based on their location.

Pennsylvania uses two formulas to decide how much state money to send to each school district, one of which is generally seen as outdated and inequitable. The other, which accounts for poverty and the number of students learning English, was designed in 2016 in light of the lawsuit.

Only new money appropriated by the legislature moves through the so-called “fair funding formula.” At the moment, that represents roughly a quarter of the $7.8 billion the state sends directly to school districts to support K-12 education.

After receiving state funding, districts are left to pad out much of their budgets through property taxes, which vary widely and tend to disproportionately burden poor areas.

Lawyers for the General Assembly, which until last year was completely controlled by Republicans, spent years trying to have the case thrown out, arguing that the issue was not within the court’s jurisdiction and that the new funding formula had rendered the case moot.

That effort failed, and Commonwealth Court heard oral arguments in the case for 13 weeks between November 2021 and February 2022. Judge Renee Cohn Jubilier, who was elected as a Republican, delivered an 800-page decision a year later siding with the schools.

She stopped short of identifying any one solution, instead writing that changes do not need to be “entirely financial. The options for reform are virtually limitless.”

“All witnesses agree that every child can learn,” wrote Jubelirer. “It is now the obligation of the Legislature, Executive Branch, and educators, to make the constitutional promise a reality in this Commonwealth.”

Last fall, the commission held 11 hearings across the commonwealth, from Pittsburgh to Hazleton to Hanover, collecting testimony on Pennsylvania’s education system. But as policymakers listened in to craft the final report, debates over education policy drove the Capitol’s contentious year.

Legislative Republicans, who control the state Senate, have focused on structural changes to public education, such as expanding vocational education, while offering alternatives through private schools. For instance, the state Senate passed a budget bill last June that included $100 million in public money for private school vouchers.

Shapiro has shown support both for public and private education.

As attorney general, his office filed a 2022 brief in favor of the districts’ arguments for more state funding. His first budget spent more than $10 billion on K-12 education, a new record, and included funding for special education, school meals, student-teacher stipends and vocational education.

But Shapiro, to the consternation of public school advocates, has also repeatedly said he backs using tax dollars to fund private school vouchers.

Should the legislature and Shapiro fail to find common ground, the state could end up back in court.

At a news conference in early January, PA School Works, a coalition that includes the Education Law Center and other public education advocates, argued that addressing the ruling will cost at least $6.2 billion.

They called for a $2 billion down payment within the coming fiscal year, with the rest spent over the following four years. That number, advocates noted, doesn’t include needed spending on school building repairs or pre-K.

“We are prepared to go back to court to defend the rights of those families,” Deborah Gordan Klehr, executive director of the Education Law Center, said at the news conference.

Spotlight PA’s Katie Meyer contributed reporting.

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HARRISBURG — A political group almost entirely funded by Pennsylvania’s richest resident has contributed one out of every three dollars raised this year by candidates running in critical statewide judicial races.

The group, Commonwealth Leaders Fund, has spent over $2.7 million, the vast majority to support just one candidate: Montgomery County judge Carolyn Carluccio, a Republican running for a seat on the state Supreme Court.

The position comes with great power. In recent years, the high court threw out the state’s congressional map for being overtly partisan, allowed a lawsuit challenging the state’s education funding system to go to trial, and upheld the state’s mail voting law.

Appellate court races in Pennsylvania have become increasingly high-profile — and expensive — since 2015. That year, Democrats flipped the state’s high court after spending $15.8 million to win three open seats. Republicans see this year’s race as a must-win as they move to retake control of the court by as early as 2025.

From the beginning of the year through late September, the eight major party candidates for Supreme, Superior, and Commonwealth Courts collectively raised $8.3 million.

Much of that money can be traced to libertarian billionaire Jeff Yass, co-founder of the stock trading company Susquehanna International Group and an advocate for alternatives to public schools.

Individuals and committees can make unlimited political donations under Pennsylvania’s relatively lax campaign finance law, and Yass, who has a roughly $28.5 billion net worth, has embraced that permissiveness.

He does not directly donate to candidates. Instead, he contributes money to his own political action committee, Students First. That committee gives money to another PAC, this one controlled by ​​Matt Brouillette, a conservative activist-turned-GOP power player. That group then contributes to Commonwealth Leaders Fund.

Even in an odd-year election, Yass’ dollars flow everywhere, popping up in municipal races in Philadelphia and Allegheny County and in contests for statewide benches, said Eric Rosso, a leftist Philadelphia political operative who has closely tracked Yass’ political activity.

“The fact that he is one of the biggest, almost sole, investor in the Supreme Court should raise red flags to anybody who cares about the integrity of government,” Rosso said.

In a statement, Brouillette, treasurer of Commonwealth Leaders Fund, said the group supports Carluccio because “she is a highly qualified judge who will uphold the Constitution, apply the law as written, and not make decisions based on partisan ideology.”

Traditional Democratic donors, such as the associations representing trial lawyers and many trade unions, have also thrown big money behind that party’s candidates.

As the Nov. 7 election approaches, expect more cash to flow to these candidates and to efforts to raise awareness about the stakes of the races.

Other outside groups may influence the election in its closing weeks through independent expenditures, which are done without the knowledge or consent of the political campaign they hope to aid. For instance, abortion provider Planned Parenthood’s political arm has promised to spend six figures on independent ads targeting Carluccio.

Reports of such spending, which can include TV ads, political mail, or paid canvassing, aren’t due until Election Day.

Supreme Court

One seat is vacant on the state Supreme Court, which has the final say on legal issues ranging from election policy to abortion access, because of the death of Chief Justice Max Baer, who was first elected as a Democrat, last fall. Judges elected as Democrats currently have a 4-2 majority on the seven-member court.

LEARN MORE ABOUT THE PA SUPREME COURT CANDIDATES

Democrat Daniel McCaffery has raised $2 million since the beginning of the year, while Republican candidate Carluccio has raked in $3.4 million during the same time period, $2.1 million of which has come from Commonwealth Leaders Fund.

Carluccio has primarily received in-kind contributions, which are nonmonetary goods or services that a group gives to candidates with the campaign’s consent.

Commonwealth Leaders Fund has primarily supported Carluccio by paying for mail and TV ads that boost her profile or attack McCaffery. Mail ads paid for by the fund have accused McCaffery of partisanship and of receiving “smutty” emails at his official government address. In 2014, McCaffery, then a Common Pleas Court judge in Philadelphia, received two emails from his brother Seamus — then a state Supreme Court justice — including sexually explicit content, The Inquirer reported at the time.

Other ads have praised Carluccio as a “fair judge” and touted her endorsements from the PA Pro-Life Federation and the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry.

Judicial candidates in Pennsylvania operate under special rules, said Sam Chen, a GOP political operative based in the Lehigh Valley. They cannot directly share their political opinions and cannot ask directly anyone for a donation, so they instead leave fundraising to campaign staff.

That makes the races harder to sell to traditional, individual donors, and encourages big political groups to flex their monetary muscle, Chen said.

“When you have the opportunity to collaborate with an outside group that wants to help you, like Commonwealth [Leaders Fund], you definitely take the opportunity if you are the candidate,” he said.

That strategy has paid off in the past. Commonwealth Leaders Fund provided roughly two-thirds of Supreme Court Justice Kevin Brobson’s $3.4 million campaign coffer in 2021. Brobson, who ran as a Republican, won an open seat on the bench by less than a percentage point.

In a statement, Carluccio spokesperson Rob Brooks said that “while I can’t speak for Commonwealth Leaders Fund, I suspect they too are interested in electing justices of the Supreme Court who will apply and uphold the law only and reject judicial activism.”

Carluccio also received $75,000 from the PA Future Fund — a political action committee connected to GOP power player Bob Asher — and donated at least $25,000 to her own campaign.

McCaffery, a current Superior Court judge, has brought in $750,000 came from Committee for a Better Tomorrow, a PAC run by the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association. Another $250,000 was donated by the PA Judicial PAC, which is the fundraising arm of the statewide trial attorneys association.

McCaffery also raised a sizable amount from organized labor: around $400,000 from a slew of trade unions such as the Greater PA Carpenters PAC — the political fundraising wing of a statewide association of carpenters — the Mid-Atlantic Laborer’s Political League, and Philadelphia’s International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 98.

He also received $72,000 from the state Democratic Party in the form of an in-kind contribution that paid for mail ads and postage.

Superior Court

One of two intermediate appellate courts, Superior Court hears appeals on criminal trials and handles high-profile criminal cases such as the trial of Bill Cosby.

 LEARN MORE ABOUT THE SUPERIOR COURT CANDIDATES

Two of the 15 seats on Superior Court will be on the ballot this November, so each major party is offering two candidates.

The four candidates have collectively raised around $1.8 million, the bulk of which went to Democratic candidate Jill Beck.

All told, the two Democratic candidates raised about six times the amount of funds as their Republican counterparts.

Beck, a commercial litigation attorney, raised about $1 million. More than $186,000 came from the state Democratic Party in the form of in-kind contributions that went toward design, production and postage, according to campaign finance reports.

She also received $125,000 from the Committee for a Better Tomorrow and about $230,000 from union and labor organizations for operating engineers, painters and metalworkers, among others. Beck also received smaller donations from political organizations such as Conservation Voters of PA and Progressive Women of NEPA.

The second Democrat, Philadelphia Common Pleas Judge Timika Lane, raised nearly $580,000 in total, with over a third of the funds coming from the Committee for a Better Tomorrow, which donated $200,000. She also received around $115,000 in donations from unions.

Lane received smaller donations, under $3,000, from organizations such as the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 5 PAC and the PA Democratic State Committee Women’s Caucus PAC.

Republican candidates Maria Battista and Harry Smail have raised around $250,000 collectively since the beginning of the year. Commonwealth Leaders Fund has not donated to these candidates.

Battista, who previously worked as general counsel for various state agencies, raised just $143,000, the bulk of which was a $50,000 donation from Martin Judge — chair and founder of the Judge Group, a business technology consulting organization. She also received about $10,000 from the Pennsylvania Republican Party, mostly in the form of in-kind donations, which paid for campaign literature and postage. She also received a $250 donation from former Trump ambassador to Denmark and previous U.S. Senate candidate Carla Sands.

Smail, a Westmoreland County Common Pleas judge, raised a similar amount, just under $110,000, over the course of the year.

Major donors included the For-Ward PAC — the fundraising committee of state Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward, R-Westmoreland, which is chaired by her husband — which gave $27,000. The Pennsylvania Republican Party gave Smail just under $10,000 in the form of an in-kind donation for printing and postage.

Commonwealth Court

The other intermediate appellate court, Commonwealth Court hears cases relating to administrative and civil law. It is often the first court to take a look at cases concerning critical issues like redistricting and election administration. The nine-member court is also responsible for hearing cases involving state governments or agencies.

LEARN MORE ABOUT THE COMMONWEALTH COURT CANDIDATES

The fundraising disparities between the two candidates for this race are huge, with Commonwealth Leaders Fund playing a major role.

Republican Megan Martin, the state Senate’s former parliamentarian, has raised just over $850,000 since the beginning of the year. The largest donation — nearly $600,000 — came from Commonwealth Leaders Fund as in-kind contributions for campaign mail.

Martin received around $46,000 from her former state Senate colleagues, including from the campaign committees of prominent members like Doug Mastriano, R-Franklin), Scott Martin, R-Lancaster, and Joe Pittman, R-Armstrong. The Pennsylvania Republican Party also donated nearly $10,000 in the form of an in-kind contribution to pay for mailing and postage.

Martin also raised $16,000 from union organizations such as the Mid-Atlantic Laborers, Boilermakers Local 154 and the Western Pennsylvania Laborers.

Democratic candidate Matt Wolf, a Philadelphia municipal court judge, has raised just under $200,000 since the beginning of the year. His largest donor was the Greater PA Carpenters PAC, which gave him about $65,000 in total. Wolf also received about $45,000 from other union and labor organizations for plumbers, transport workers and plasterer and cement masons.

Wolf also received a $25,000 donation from Committee for a Better Tomorrow and gave his own campaign about $50,000.

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HARRISBURG — A proxy fight over abortion led by state House Republicans jeopardizes hundreds of millions of dollars in tuition assistance for Pennsylvania college students.

At issue is public funding for Pennsylvania’s four state-related universities — Lincoln University, Penn State University, Temple University, and the University of Pittsburgh. Last year, the state allocated almost $600 million to these four institutions. Most of the money subsidizes in-state tuition for Pennsylvanians.

On Monday, the state House voted 108-92 to approve an amendment that would require the schools to swear under oath they do not “engage in research or experimentation using fetal tissue obtained from an elective abortion” to receive state funding.

The move is the culmination of years of pressure from opponents of abortion access, who have argued since at least 2019 that Pitt’s funding should be axed for research conducted using tissue obtained from aborted fetuses.

The vote complicates budget negotiations as GOP lawmakers and Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf try to complete the process before the June 30 deadline.

In recent years, the number of Republican representatives who support blocking Pitt’s funding has steadily increased.

Legislative rules make blocking the funding fairly easy. Two-thirds of lawmakers must agree to fund educational institutions not under the complete control of the state, like Pitt and Penn State. That means the defection of 68 Republican representatives — just over half of the caucus — is enough to prevent Pitt from getting taxpayer dollars.

In May 2021, one anti-abortion activist advised lawmakers at a public hearing to “exercise all of the oversight authority that is available to you” to ensure that “crimes … are not being perpetuated in Pennsylvania by an unaccountable taxpayer-funded abortion industry.”

Under pressure from lawmakers, Pitt hired a law firm to conduct an independent review of its research practices. Released in December 2021, the review found that the 31 studies using fetal tissue since 2001 had all been “conducted in compliance with federal and state laws.”

Those laws, for instance, ban financial compensation for fetal tissue and require researchers to be approved by an internal university board before they begin their research.

Despite the findings, multiple Republican lawmakers, including top leaders, faced political attacks from anti-abortion groups for voting for Pitt’s funding. Some lost their primary this year.

Insiders have noted that multiple factors could be contributing to the opposition to Pitt’s funding, including former university chancellor Mark Nordenberg’s stint as chair of the state’s redistricting commission, which produced a state House map that will likely reduce Republicans’ majority, and an overall distrust of higher education institutions.

But on the floor Monday, state Rep. Jerry Knowles (R., Schuylkill) focused on the tissue research when he offered his rider to the funding bill for the four state-related universities.

He described a 2020 study that involved the grafting of fetal skin onto lab rats to analyze hair growth, before telling lawmakers that a vote for the amendment would be supported by influential groups that oppose abortion access, including the Pennsylvania Family Council and the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference.

“My goal is not to stop the funding,” Knowles said. “As a matter of fact, I want to help Pitt get themselves out of a problem they have created for themselves.”

While the amendment may have won the backing of many state House Republicans, the research ban does not appear to have the same level of support elsewhere in the Capitol as lawmakers try to put the finishing touches on the state’s budget.

In an email, a spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Kim Ward (R., Westmoreland) said that the chamber needs to review anything that comes from the state House first. But generally, “the Senate does not believe that students and their in-state tuition status should be held hostage to research grants established by” the National Institutes of Health.

“Any such issues can be addressed outside of the budget process,” spokesperson Erica Clayton Wright added.

Wolf also signaled his opposition. His spokesperson, Elizabeth Rementer, said the ban would “jeopardize important funding that supports tuition assistance, education and research at a world-class university.”

The spending plan, due under state law by June 30, has been delayed by conflicting priorities between Wolf and legislative Republicans, as well as differences among GOP lawmakers. The exact funding levels for the universities and dozens of other items, from basic education to human services, are still under negotiation.

As of Wednesday, talks were ongoing. Despite pessimism among Capitol sources early Tuesday, Ward said in the afternoon that “we’re getting to a good spot.” More action is expected Wednesday.

Still, the funding for the state-related universities remains a stumbling block.

The bill to approve the universities’ funding — without the research ban — passed the state Senate 44-5 earlier this month, comfortably above the two-thirds margin needed. All the dissenters were Republicans, including GOP gubernatorial candidate and state Sen. Doug Mastriano (R., Franklin).

This year, the state Senate combined funding for the state-related schools into a single bill, rather than the separate bills seen traditionally.

That tactic is commonly used in the legislature to muscle through politically unpopular options — in this case, Pitt’s funding — with less controversial measures. The hope is that the good outweighs the bad, and swings some votes from no to yes.

The state House voted to add the research ban amendment Monday, but the bill awaits a final vote by the chamber. While the amendment only needed a simple majority to be approved, the bill needs two-thirds of lawmakers to back it — meaning Democrats will have to get on board.

At a Tuesday news conference, Democratic legislators from western Pennsylvania said they will not support the legislation.

“I do believe that individuals are entitled to their own views and personal beliefs around abortion,” state Rep. Sara Innamorato (D., Allegheny) said. “What they are not entitled to do is to spread misinformation in the name of them and stop life-saving and life-sustaining research.”

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HARRISBURG — While Pennsylvania voters might look to the General Assembly to take action on new gun laws after the massacre of nearly 20 children in Texas, the judiciary will likely determine the direction of the commonwealth’s firearms policies in the coming months.

Three distinct suits are being appealed to the state’s highest court, all arguing that cities and municipalities in Pennsylvania should be allowed to pass their own gun laws.

The suits — which involve the state’s two largest cities, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh — seek to either loosen or overturn a nearly three-decade-old precedent that gives the legislature the sole authority to regulate gun ownership throughout the state.

Advocates for and against stricter gun policies in Pennsylvania say court action could have broad consequences. In one of the cases involving Philadelphia, the state Supreme Court is being asked to strike down as unconstitutional a 1995 law that preempts local jurisdictions from enacting stricter gun regulations — which could in turn force the legislature to rewrite it.

“Ours is a full-on attack on the firearm preemption,” said Mimi McKenzie, legal director of the Public Interest Law Center in Philadelphia and one of the attorneys handling the case.

In that lawsuit, the city of Philadelphia argued that the legislature’s steadfast refusal to strengthen laws aimed at reducing rising gun violence has prevented local governments from taking actions to protect their constituents.

The city — which brought the suit with CeaseFirePA, a nonprofit that seeks to reduce gun violence, and residents who have lost loved ones to firearms — said that gun violence disproportionately impacts low-income communities and communities of color, and that the state’s preemption law has endangered their lives, health, and safety in violation of the state constitution.

A panel of state appellate court judges disagreed.

Last week, Commonwealth Court dismissed the lawsuit in a 3-2 decision. It cited, among other factors, precedent from previous cases — including a key state Supreme Court ruling affirming the legislature’s exclusive right to write gun laws — that unsuccessfully sought to give local governments more say in regulating firearms.

Judge Patricia McCullough, a Republican who wrote the opinion, said legislators wrote the law to ensure that “citizens of the Commonwealth would not be subjected to varying and differing firearm regulations as they travel from town to town.”

Even if the legislature was aware that certain parts of the state could potentially be exposed to greater gun violence, it “had a legitimate, countervailing government interest” in passing laws to ensure uniformity.

But in an unusual move, the court amended its decision shortly after it was issued to include a nod to the need for more public discourse on guns.

And another judge suggested it might be time for the state’s highest court to reconsider precedent.

In a concurring opinion, Judge Renee Cohn Jubelirer, a Republican, highlighted the toll that gun violence takes on certain communities, which she said could justify stricter restrictions than those that exist in state law. She said the “novel” constitutional arguments raised by the city could provide a basis for the state Supreme Court to reexamine the preemption question.

Jubelirer quoted a senior judge in a separate case involving gun preemption laws, who wrote, “It is neither just to impose unnecessarily harsh limits in communities where they are not required nor consistent with simple humanity to deny basic safety regulations to citizens who desperately need them.”

In the Pittsburgh case, McCullough again wrote the majority opinion, which was also issued last week. Along with her colleagues on the bench, she sided with a coalition of pro-gun access groups who sued the city when it passed stricter gun measures, including an assault weapons ban, after the Tree of Life synagogue mass shooting. The 2018 massacre left 11 people dead in America’s deadliest antisemitic attack.

The city of Pittsburgh argued that the legislature had not preempted all firearms regulations at the local level. McCullough disagreed, saying lawmakers had made their uniformity intentions “unambiguous.”

But she again acknowledged the national debate over how to address gun violence.

“The precious lives lost to senseless violence in our nation is beyond tragic,” she wrote. “The systemic issues and divisiveness in this once united nation are painfully apparent. The pressing need for peaceful public discourse with respect for our “inalienable rights to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” is imperative … for “[a] house divided against itself cannot stand.”

In a third lawsuit, decided earlier this year again by McCullough, the judge again upheld the state’s preemption on local gun ordinances. That case also is being appealed to the state Supreme Court.

The high court could decide not to accept that case, which was originally filed in Common Pleas Court and centers around a Philadelphia ordinance involving reporting lost and stolen firearms. Similarly, the justices could reject taking on the case involving the city of Pittsburgh, which also originated in a lower court.

But McKenzie said that because the Public Interest Law Center’s case challenging Pennsylvania’s preemption law as unconstitutional was filed at the appellate level, there is an automatic right of appeal to the state Supreme Court.

“They will have to address it in one way or another,” she said.

Inaction on guns isn’t new or unique to Pennsylvania. In recent years, Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf has called for stricter gun laws. But Republicans, who by and large oppose curbing gun access, have had near-total control of the General Assembly for the past three decades.

Parkland, Florida’s Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in 2018, however, spurred Pennsylvania lawmakers to take some action.

In that year’s budget, legislative leaders approved $70 million for school safety, meant to cover everything from metal detectors to more police in schools.

The Pennsylvania House Judiciary Committee at the time also called up a slew of bills for a vote, including legislation that would have mandated universal background checks. It failed to advance by a single vote.

The only related proposal to make it all the way to Wolf’s desk was Act 79, which made it quicker and easier for law enforcement to seize firearms from convicted domestic abusers.

The bill passed with wide bipartisan support, but nearly half of House Republicans opposed it. One pro-gun access legislator said it was “ramrodded through” the General Assembly; another argued on the state House floor that lives would not be saved “until we start addressing the root of the problem, getting the love of God and the love of our neighbors back into our hearts,” according to the Legislative Journal.

In the fall of 2019, gun control again jumped to the top of the national agenda after mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, that eventually claimed 33 lives.

Wolf again asked the legislature to ban assault weapons, institute universal background checks, and pass an extreme risk protection — or “red flag” — law. The latter proposal would allow police, with a judge’s order, to seize an individual’s guns if the person is at risk of harming themself or others, and had support from former President Donald Trump and other Republicans.

Despite those endorsements, state Rep. Rob Kauffman (R., Franklin) declined to advance such legislation out of his committee.

“We will not be considering red flag in the House Judiciary Committee so long as Chairman Kauffman is chairman,” Kauffman said at the time.

Instead, the committee advanced bills that would increase prison sentences for gun crimes and ease the laws that control where, when, and which weapons an individual can carry. Just one proposal of the bunch reached Wolf’s desk. The governor vetoed it.

Under pressure from conservative activists, most Republicans, with support from some Democrats, sent two more bills that would loosen gun laws to Wolf’s desk last year, including a proposal to allow for permitless concealed carry in the commonwealth. The governor also vetoed those bills.

Democrats in the legislature largely support stricter gun laws, including expanding background checks, mandatory reporting for lost and stolen guns, and requiring gun owners to lock up their firearms in a safe when not in use.

Unhappy with inaction by Republicans, House Democrats tried to force a rare floor vote on an assault weapons ban just days after the Uvalde school shooting.

The measure failed 87-111 nearly along party lines.

“No matter how many moments of silence there are, no matter how many tweets there are saying ‘thoughts and prayers,’ no matter how many times we seem to march and rally, when we get to this state capitol, nothing happens,” House Minority Leader Joanna McClinton (D., Philadelphia) said after the vote. “The laws don’t change.”

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HARRISBURG — Doug Mastriano is the projected winner of Pennsylvania’s Republican primary for governor, defeating a crowded field in a high-stakes race that will shape the state’s future.

Unofficial election results show Mastriano, a far-right state senator from Franklin County, with 43% of the vote as of Tuesday at 10 p.m. The Associated Press called the race with an estimated 50% of the votes counted.

In November, Mastriano will face Democrat Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania’s current attorney general who faced no opposition from members of his party.

Mastriano emerged from a crowded GOP field of nine candidates who have spent the past several months crisscrossing the state to rally support among party elites and the rank-and-file alike.

In the leadup to May 17, establishment Republicans attempted to stop Mastriano from winning, fearful that his rhetoric would drive away moderates in the general election. Two candidates dropped out and endorsed former U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta, who often placed second in the polls. Other top contenders, such as former U.S. prosecutor Bill McSwain and Delaware County business owner Dave White, resisted calls to back down.

At stake in November is the governor’s mansion, open because incumbent Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf is term-limited from running again. As the state’s chief executive, the next governor will have the power to sign into law — or block — changes regarding marijuana, voting rights, property taxes, and abortion.

The governor also presents a spending plan each year that proposes how billions in tax dollars are used, directs state agencies to take far-reaching regulatory actions on the environment and public health, and oversees tens of thousands of state employees, from public benefits caseworkers to correctional officers.

A bombastic speaker who sprinkles his stump speeches with historical and Biblical references, Mastriano, a retired Army colonel and Gulf War veteran, is a favorite among grassroots conservatives and evangelicals.

He appeared at or near the top of polls before the primary, despite raising just $1.6 million since the start of 2021 — near the bottom of the nine-person GOP field. Much of that total came from small individual donations, while potato roll magnate Jim Martin gave more than $100,000.

First elected to the state Senate in a 2019 special election, Mastriano started his time in Harrisburg as a conservative backbencher, best known for sharing Islamophobic memes on his campaign Facebook account and sponsoring a six-week abortion ban.

His profile began its meteoric rise in 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the world.

At first, he appeared somewhat supportive of mitigation efforts — even proposing legislation that would let public health officials release the names of people who tested positive for the coronavirus. But after a few weeks of lockdowns — ordered by the Wolf administration to prevent hospitals from becoming overwhelmed — Mastriano began railing against Wolf in daily Facebook videos and later at Capitol rallies opposing the pandemic response.

Those videos and events earned him a dedicated fandom that, by the summer of 2020, was calling for him to run for governor.

At first, Mastriano downplayed his ambitions, telling two evangelical podcasters with ties to the QAnon conspiracy theory that he’d only run if he received “God’s calling, the people … compel us to go forth, and we have the resources.”

In since-deleted tweets, Mastriano used QAnon phrases, and was twice scheduled to appear at a conference with the podcasters. He backed out in 2021 after news reports highlighted the event’s ties to the conspiracy theory, which claims that global elites and Democrats engage in Satanic behavior, but he appeared at an event organized by the podcasters last month.

Mastriano has also played a leading role in echoing former President Donald Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud.

After the November 2020 presidential contest, Mastriano conflated mail ballot totals from the primary and general elections to falsely claim more had been returned than requested. He also claimed it was “mathematically impossible that three out of four ballots would go for one person” when mail ballots, disproportionately requested by Democrats, began to be tallied. Mastriano has won his own legislative elections by similar margins.

To amplify these claims as well as Trump’s false allegations of widespread voter fraud, Mastriano hosted a taxpayer-funded meeting at a Gettysburg hotel marked by “mostly false, misleading, and mistaken testimony,” according to an analysis of the testimony by The Caucus.

Mastriano’s fight to overturn President Joe Biden’s election win culminated on Jan. 6, 2021, when he booked buses to bring supporters to Washington, D.C. for the Trump rally that preceded the insurrection.

At the time, Mastriano claimed he didn’t cross police lines or enter the U.S. Capitol, but video later emerged that showed him moving with the mob past those barriers.

He has been subpoenaed by the congressional committee investigating Jan. 6, which said in February that Mastriano “was part of a plan to arrange for an ‘alternate’ slate of electors from Pennsylvania for former President Trump and reportedly spoke with President Trump about post-election activities.”

Trump endorsed Mastriano a few days before the primary, saying in a statement, “There is no one in Pennsylvania who has done more, or fought harder, for Election Integrity than State Senator Doug Mastriano.”

Overall, Mastriano has pushed back on any questions about his past actions or who he associates with, part of his broader antipathy to the mainstream press.

“I resent the fact that you want to castigate anyone who went down to Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6 as some kind of enemy of the public,” Mastriano said in an interview with the conservative-leaning Delaware Valley Journal this month. “That is dangerous. You’re talking like an East German there.”

Since Jan. 6, Mastriano has continued to focus on unproven election fraud. He was originally tapped to lead the state Senate’s investigation into the 2020 election but feuded with Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman (R-Centre) over the scope, direction, and speed of the effort. In response, Corman removed Mastriano from his leadership role and gave it to a colleague.

Along with his Trumpian election rhetoric, Mastriano has proposed bills that would repeal no-excuse mail voting — which he voted for in 2019 — ban vaccine mandates, and regulate social media companies.

He also supports banning on abortion with no exceptions, as well as expanding natural gas drilling and access to private schools and charter schools using taxpayer funds.

He has promised that as governor he would issue executive orders on his first day in office to ban “critical race theory” — a concept often taught in law schools that has become a catchall term for curriculum on racism — and to bar trans women from playing women’s sports. He has also suggested he would deploy the Pennsylvania National Guard to Philadelphia to fight crime “as a last recourse.”

Shapiro, who has held elected office at the local or state level for the past two decades, ran unopposed in this year’s primary.

Long considered a rising star in Pennsylvania’s Democratic circles, Shapiro has campaigned on his record of tackling corporate corruption, advancing LGBTQ-friendly policies, and championing abortion rights and voter and worker protections.

As attorney general, he made international headlines in 2018 when his office released a scathing grand jury report that exposed how nearly every Catholic diocese in the state engaged in a decades-long cover-up of child sexual abuse by clergy.

The investigation was repeatedly described as the nation’s most sweeping inquiry into sexual abuse of children in the Catholic Church. It involved more than 1,000 victims, 301 “predator” priests, and dozens in the church hierarchy who knew about the abuse but buried it to shield the institution.

Shapiro’s time as attorney general has also been marked by his legal fights against some of the Trump administration’s high-profile policy changes, including efforts to roll back the Affordable Care Act’s birth control coverage mandate.

Along with other attorneys general around the country, Shapiro negotiated a multibillion dollar settlement with a major pharmaceutical manufacturer and distributors over their role in fueling the nationwide opioid crisis. Pennsylvania’s share of the settlement stands at $1 billion, money that’s to be used for opioid remediation programs and initiatives.

Shapiro began his career in government in the 1990s, working for a member of Congress and two senators in Washington, D.C. He was elected to Pennsylvania’s House of Representatives in 2004, where he served four terms representing parts of Montgomery County in the Philadelphia suburbs.

In 2011, he won a seat on Montgomery County’s Board of Commissioners in a year when Democrats took control over the three-member panel for the first time in the county’s history. He was elected attorney general in 2016 and again in 2020 for a second, four-year term.

In announcing his candidacy for governor last year, Shapiro, who has built a reputation as a tireless campaigner and prolific fundraiser, quickly cleared the field — despite some talk early on that he would be challenged by a more progressive Democrat.

Running unopposed gave him an instant advantage over the crowded, nine-way primary field of GOP contenders. He has amassed more than $20 million in campaign contributions since the start of 2021, eclipsing fundraising on the Republican side.

He is entering the post-primary landscape with nearly $16 million on hand, largely because he was not forced to spend his war chest edging out competitors.

Other results

Contentious races for an open U.S. Senate seat were also on the ballot Tuesday.

John Fetterman, the state’s current lieutenant governor, defeated three other Democrats for his party’s nod. The Associated Press called the race less than two hours after polls closed Tuesday.

Fetterman had a pacemaker implanted on Election Day after he suffered a stroke last week.

As of 10:30 p.m. Tuesday, the Associated Press had yet to declare a Republican winner. The crowded field is being led by former hedge fund CEO Dave McCormick and celebrity surgeon Mehmet Oz.

Democrats and Republicans also voted to pick their candidates for lieutenant governor. Pennsylvania is among a minority of states that elects its governors and lieutenant governors separately in the primary, but then as a single ticket in the general election.

Austin Davis and Carrie Lewis DelRosso, both state representatives from Allegheny County, won the Democratic and Republican nods, respectively, according to the Associated Press.

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HARRISBURG — The outcome of the Pennsylvania governor’s race could determine the future of legal abortion access in the state, which is uncertain following the leak of a draft U.S. Supreme Court opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade.

Such a decision would leave how, where, and why someone could get a legal abortion, if at all, up to each state’s legislature and governor. All nine of the Republican gubernatorial candidates in Pennsylvania support additional abortion restrictions, and at least five would seek a complete ban with no exceptions.

Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, a former Planned Parenthood clinic escort who is statutorily unable to seek another term, has blocked efforts by the GOP-controlled legislature to further curtail abortion access during his seven years in office. Republicans will likely maintain control of both the state House and Senate this November, raising the stakes in an already critical governor’s race.

According to a draft opinion circulated within the court and reported by Politico Monday night, the U.S. Supreme Court has already voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, a landmark court decision that has protected the right to abortion for almost 50 years. Chief Justice John Roberts on Tuesday confirmed the draft’s authenticity but said it was not final.

“We’ve gotten to this point because of a well-organized and continuously mobilized pro-life movement that has spent the last half-century working to this goal,” said Lehigh University sociologist Ziad Munson, who has written about abortion politics.

Opponents of abortion celebrated the leaked opinion with a mix of hope for the future, but also some reservations as to what the court’s final decision will be.

Michael Ciccocioppo, executive director of the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation, said in an email that the group “will let the Supreme Court speak for itself and wait for the Court’s official opinion,” and declined to comment “on hypothetical questions in this matter.”

For now, at least, the precedent set in Roe v. Wade and affirmed in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey will remain in place.

“Let’s be clear: Abortion is still legal,” Planned Parenthood Southeastern Pennsylvania President and CEO Dayle Steinberg said.

Under state law, abortion is legal up to 24 weeks into a pregnancy, with later exceptions made for extraordinary circumstances like the health of the person giving birth.

The Abortion Control Act, a 1982 law that regulates abortion in Pennsylvania, already includes significant restrictions. People seeking abortions are required to wait for 24 hours after receiving mandatory counseling, and minors cannot receive abortions without parental consent.

It is also the only law regulating a medical procedure written into the state criminal code, said Sue Frietsche, founder and director of the Western Pennsylvania office of the Women’s Law Project. The act carries heavy criminal and civil penalties for doctors and nurses who violate it.

“It’s a manifestation of abortion stigma,” she said. “The purpose of our legislature in putting what is really the regulation of health care into the crimes code is to cast a cloud of unsavory suspicion over the whole area.”

The state of access, and what the future could bring

Should the court strike Roe down, nothing would immediately change for Pennsylvanians.

In the short term, abortion providers expect Pennsylvania to become a sanctuary for people from states where access would end if Roe were overturned, said Melissa Reed, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Keystone.

Without Roe, Reed said she expects an additional 8,500 patients to arrive annually from other states on top of the 7,600 abortion patients Planned Parenthood Keystone serves each year.

“I think it’s important that people know that the consequences of this are going to be truly dangerous and unprecedented,” Reed said.

But depending on who succeeds Wolf as governor, the situation could change rapidly for Pennsylvania residents.

At least five of the nine GOP candidates for governor — Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Gale, conservative strategist Charlie Gerow, state Sen. Doug Mastriano (R., Franklin), former Delaware County Council Member Dave White, and Poconos surgeon Nche Zama — have said they support abortion bans without exceptions for rape, incest, or the life of the parent.

At a debate in late April, Mastriano, who has consistently appeared at or near the top of polls, called legal abortion “a national catastrophe,” before promising to “move with alacrity” on a six-week abortion ban.

“We lack a William Wilberforce of our time,” Mastriano said, comparing the movement to abolish slavery in 18th and 19th century Britain to efforts to restrict abortion access. “We don’t have any champions in Pennsylvania.”

A sixth candidate, former U.S. Rep. Melissa Hart (R., Pa.), said she would only support an exception for the life of the parent. Anything else, she said, would be inconsistent.

“If you believe this is a child, and this child has a right to life, then we can work with the pregnant mother through the crisis,” Hart told Spotlight PA.

The three other candidates have also backed stricter abortion laws, but said they’d support some exceptions. Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman (R., Centre), former federal prosecutor Bill McSwain, and former U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta (R., Pa.) have all said they’d allow abortion in cases of rape, incest, or the life of the parent.

Attorney General Josh Shapiro, the only Democratic candidate for governor who will appear on the May 17 primary ballot, supports maintaining access to abortion.

“The next governor will have a bill on their desk to restrict or outlaw abortion rights,” Shapiro said during a press call Tuesday. “I will of course veto it. My opponent will sign it.”

The legislature’s support

With Wolf’s veto a sure thing, Republican lawmakers — with the support of some of their Democratic colleagues — have passed multiple bills to further restrict abortion access, including a 20-week ban in 2017. The Democratic governor rejected all of them.

But a Republican governor asking for a complete ban would spark a “very intense” internal conversation among GOP legislators, said state Rep. Tom Mehaffie (R., Dauphin).

“I am definitely pro-life,” Mehaffie said, “but I do believe in the exceptions. I have always been upfront about that.”

A lot could change between now and 2023, he added, as a wave of legislative retirements and new political maps brings fresh faces to the General Assembly who do not share his reservations.

Republican candidates who no longer support even the limited exceptions for rape, incest, or the life of the parent are proof of how successful the movement to restrict abortion has been, said Munson of Lehigh University.

The exceptions started as a compromise “that the movement never really wanted, but the public does by a wide margin,” Munson said.

A March 2022 Franklin & Marshall College poll found that 31% of Pennsylvania voters think abortion should be legal in all circumstances, 13% in none, and 53% under “certain circumstances.” What those circumstances are was not defined in the question.

In an email, House Republican spokesperson Jason Gottesman cautioned that the GOP was still awaiting confirmation of the court’s opinion and that “any true direction or plan would be premature.”

“We will continue to review pending pro-life legislation and any further decisions will be made through the course of the normal legislative process,” Gottesman said.

In a statement, House Minority Leader Joanna McClinton (D., Philadelphia) said she expects “our hyper-conservative legislature, which routinely embraces culturally divisive issues” to “invariably act on yesterday’s SCOTUS news.”

Democrats, she added, “are committed to this fight and will work alongside our partners to ensure women’s rights are secure in the commonwealth.”

The state’s courts could also play a role in the coming debate.

A lawsuit pending before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, filed by abortion providers against the state Department of Human Services, could enshrine the procedure as a protected right under the state constitution’s equal protection clause. Attorneys from the Women’s Law Project are part of the legal team representing the providers.

The suit argues Pennsylvania’s Medicaid program discriminates against women and people who give birth, Frietsche said, by denying coverage for abortion because of “gender-based stereotypes about women’s proper role.”

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