Wolf, lawmakers in legal clash over emergency declaration
HARRISBURG » The executive and legislative branches neared a legal clash Wednesday over the emergency disaster declaration Gov. Tom Wolf issued at the beginning of the pandemic, with the majority Republicans voting to end it, the Democratic governor insisting he holds veto power and business owners left in limbo.
The Legislature late Tuesday declared an end to Wolf’s 3-month-old emergency declaration when members voted largely along party lines.
Republicans asserted their resolution paved the way for businesses shut down by Wolf’s order to reopen. Wolf said that it did no such thing, that the shuttering of “non-life-sustaining” businesses had been authorized by his health secretary under a different law.
Their dispute quickly landed in court, with Senate Republicans suing to compel Wolf to issue an executive order officially ending the coronavirus emergency.
“State law allows for the temporary suspension of civil liberties under dire circumstances,” Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati said in a written statement. “We allowed the governor that time initially to flatten the curve. The need to suspend civil liberties in the interest of public health and safety has clearly passed.”
Wolf, who has beaten back previous legal challenges on his actions to combat the virus, welcomed the chance to argue that Republicans had overstepped their authority.
“I’m going to continue to focus on protecting Pennsylvanians and navigating our recovery, but I’ll tell you one thing: Ending the disaster declaration is not part of that plan,” Wolf said at a news conference Wednesday.
He ticked off a list of things he said would end if the Republicans get their way, including relaxed eligibility requirements for unemployment compensation, moratoriums on evictions and utility shutoffs, and emergency food distribution networks that serve needy children.
“The choice we have is whether we prioritize safety by reopening carefully with precautions in place, or whether we just create chaos and confusion through carelessness,” Wolf said.
Supporters of the resolution — which they asserted would do away with many, if not all, pandemic restrictions — said that state law authorizes the Legislature to end the emergency declaration unilaterally. House leadership also threatened legal action.
With about 2 million Pennsylvania residents filing unemployment claims since mid-March, Republicans have been pressing Wolf to reopen the state’s battered economy more quickly and more broadly.