Pennsylvania

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The Nov. 3 presidential contest will test Pennsylvania's ability to handle a massive mail-in vote and, while its high court settled several partisan points of dispute over how to update the state's election law, counties remain unprepared in several important ways. Plus, the legal challenges are not necessarily over.

A federal judge has ruled that Gov. Tom Wolf's pandemic restrictions that required people to stay at home, placed size limits on gatherings and ordered "non-life-sustaining" businesses to shut down are unconstitutional. U.S.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Gov. Tom Wolf's administration is asking the state Supreme Court to extend deadlines for mail-in ballots in the November election.  Pennsylvania will be a premier presidential battleground in the race between President Donald Trump and Vice President Joe Biden.

The filing, submitted late Thursday, cited a letter dated July 29 by the general counsel of the U.S. Postal Service, Thomas Marshall. In it, Marshall warns that Pennsylvania's election-day deadline for mail-in ballots is "incongruous" with the postal service's delivery standards.

Tuesday is primary election day in Pennsylvania, which the state postponed from April because of the coronavirus. Besides the date change, this year’s primary will also feel different with potentially longer lines at polling places even though fewer voters are expected to show up. 

Denise Meyer, an election judge in Centre County, said she’ll be working at her precinct in Ferguson Township for the primary, because she feels an obligation.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Gov. Tom Wolf is ordering the closure of all schools in Pennsylvania for two weeks, as the state takes sweeping measures aimed at slowing the spread of the new coronavirus. 

The order affecting more than 1.7 million school children came as confirmed cases in the state leaped to 33 from 22.

In a statement, Wolf said "no school district will be penalized if it fails to meet the 180 day or school hours requirements."

For a second year, Pennsylvania’s School Safety and Security Committee has approved more than $60 million in school safety funding, which was announced Wednesday. The Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency said demands for funding to improve safety in Pennsylvania schools remained strong.

PCCD received a total of 970 applications during this round of funding, and the total cost of all those projects was $134.5 million. 

Pennsylvania Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati tells The Associated Press he will not seek re-election. Scarnati made the announcement Wednesday night. The 58-year-old is a fifth-term Republican senator from Jefferson County in northwestern Pennsylvania. He says he wrestled with the decision but thought it was the right time to step down after 14 years in a job steering a Republican majority through turbulent elections and fights in the Capitol. Scarnati rose quickly, becoming Senate president in 2007 with the endorsement of his predecessor after just six years in the chamber.

Last year’s grand jury report detailing sexual assault allegations against 301 Catholic priests in Pennsylvania raised the question: how would the church respond?

In the months that followed, seven of the eight dioceses in Pennsylvania launched compensation funds, following the model set by dioceses in New York.

These programs, which started winding down at the end of September, offer a lump sum to victims in return for signing away the right to sue the church over their allegations. 

The deadline to register to vote in the November election is fast approaching.

And while it’s an off year for high-profile races, Pennsylvanians will be deciding a major ballot measure.

SEATTLE (AP) — Seventeen states sued the Trump administration Wednesday to block rules weakening the Endangered Species Act, saying the changes would make it tougher to protect wildlife even in the midst of a global extinction crisis.
The lawsuit, in federal court in San Francisco, follows a similar challenge filed last month by several environmental groups, including the Humane Society and the Sierra Club.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf is now in favor of legalizing marijuana for recreational use, saying Wednesday that most of the state's residents support it and that the state has a wealth of knowledge from the experience in other states to guide it.
Wolf, a second-term Democrat, packaged his announcement with a call to the Republican-controlled Legislature to decriminalize small amounts of marijuana and allow the expungement of past convictions of nonviolent and small marijuana-related crimes.

Pennsylvania dairy farmers have been under continuous pressure of decreasing fluid milk consumption in the country and tight markets met by production surpluses and tariffs. Congressman Glenn Thompson led a summit at Mount Aloysius College in Cambria County Monday, reassuring producers and farmers that a handful of new policies would offer meaningful assistance to the industry.

(Harrisburg) -- Democratic state lawmakers are criticizing the Trump Administration over its proposed plan to restrict Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits for certain people.

They say the change amounts to a punishment for the poor. 

Right now, people who receive Temporary Assistance for Needy Families—or TANF—are also considered eligible for SNAP.

But the US Department of Agriculture is proposing limiting that eligibility to people who get at least $50 in TANF benefits per month.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Pennsylvania's message was clear: The state was taking a big step to keep its elections from being hacked in 2020. Last April, its top election official told counties they had to update their systems. So far, nearly 60% have taken action, with $14.15 million of mostly federal funds helping counties buy brand-new electoral systems.
But there's a problem: Many of these new systems still run on old software that will soon be outdated and more vulnerable to hackers.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Pennsylvania's Republican Party chairman is stepping down following a published report that he had traded sexually charged text messages with a Philadelphia City Council candidate and also sent her an explicit photo of himself.
Val DiGiorgio's resignation was announced Tuesday by the state GOP.
In a letter to party officials, the 51-year-old DiGiorgio says the report by The Philadelphia Inquirer contains "gross mischaracterizations" of what he said were "mutual consensual communications."

A minor earthquake hit Central Pennsylvania Wednesday night. The U.S. Geological Survey reports the quake, with a preliminary magnitude of 3.4, struck at around 8:31 p.m. The epicenter was located in Juniata county, Pa., about 11 miles south/southwest of Mifflintown. Reports of mild shaking came in to the U.S.G.S website from Altoona to Lancaster, and from State College to Hagerstown, Md.

A new report released on Monday by the Center for Rural Pennsylvania says the Federal Communications Commission overstates broadband internet availability and access across Pennsylvania.

Tuesday, May 28, 9:50 p.m.
The National Weather Service says a tornado has been confirmed in eastern Pennsylvania where homes have been damaged but there were no immediate reports of injuries.
Meteorologist Jonathan O'Brien says a damage assessment team will be sent to the area Wednesday to determine the strength of the twister that struck Tuesday.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Weather officials say Pennsylvania has already recorded the average number of tornados for a year.
Meteorologist Sarah Johnson of the National Weather Service office in Mount Holly, New Jersey says 16 tornadoes that have had preliminary confirmation in the commonwealth so far this year.
Severe weather is more common in June and into July, but Johnson cautions that that is by no means a hard and fast rule. For example, a large outbreak of severe weather was recorded Oct. 2 of last year across the commonwealth, she said.

A few months ago, Daniel Klein bought two flags to hang on a chainlink fence outside his home in rural Wyoming County.

They say “Trump 2020: No More Bulls---.”

Some people driving along wooded Route 29 stop to take pictures. Some blow their horns.

“I don’t know whether they’re throwing me the bird or saying, ‘Good job,’ but I don’t care,” Klein said.

John Hecker pointed out the window of the truck as it passed oak, maple and birch trees in the Pennsylvania Wilds.

Up ahead was a fork in the road.

The state has approved $40 million in grants for school districts to improve safety.

Over a dozen school districts in Central Pennsylvania received grants, including the Altoona Area School District, the Keystone Central School District and the Smethport Area School District. None of Centre County’s school district was awarded a competitive grant.

These competitive grants are in addition to $25,000 that most districts received last year.

Third highest in the nation.

That’s how Pennsylvania ranks in the price of attending a public university according to the most recent report from College Board, with an the average cost of $14,770 for in-state tuition and fees in the 2018-19 academic year.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Fresh from a victory in Pennsylvania last fall, anti-gun violence advocates are turning their attention to legislation to empower family members or police to seek the immediate, if temporary, seizure of someone's firearms.
Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America went to the state Capitol on Monday to press the case for the bill, sometimes called a "red flag" bill in other states.
Under it, someone who is deemed to represent a danger of suicide or a serious threat to another person could be the subject of an "extreme risk protection order."

As a nationwide ban took effect this week, gun owners must immediately destroy or turn over their bump stocks after President Trump pushed the Justice Department to classify the controversial gun add-on as a type of illegal machine gun.

The gun accessory attaches to the butt of a semi-automatic rifle, allowing the weapon to reload and fire more rapidly.

The device became a focal point in the country's debate about gun violence in the months after law enforcement officials said a shooter used one to kill 58 people in Las Vegas in October 2017.

(Harrisburg) -- The state House swore in its first-ever Muslim woman on Monday.

Movita Johnson-Harrell won her Philadelphia seat in a special election earlier this month. A mother and grandmother, she arrived in Harrisburg with 55 guests, more than half of whom she said were fellow Muslims.

But she said her first day in office was marred by an "offensive" invocation before her induction.

HARRISBURG (AP) — Gov. Tom Wolf rolled out a second-term proposal Wednesday to vault Pennsylvania's minimum wage to one of the highest in the nation after similar first-term proposals by the Democrat fell flat in the Republican-controlled Legislature.
Wolf wants to take the hourly minimum to $12 this year, putting Pennsylvania in line with the highest state minimum wages, according to federal data. Pennsylvania also would join a handful of states by eliminating its tipped wage minimum, now $2.83, under legislation being introduced with Wolf's support.