Fundraising lags for Democrats in judicial races

Based on fundraising activity, this year’s statewide judicial races are shaping up to be a little boring — even for judicial races.

That may disappoint TV ad executives and Democrats, who in 2015 rode a massive financial advantage to sweep the Supreme Court and two lower-court races.

According to an estimate by Kantar Media/CMAG, an unprecedented $12.5 million was spent on TV ads in 2015, when three Supreme Court seats were at stake. But based on campaign-finance reports filed last month, such a barrage seems unlikely this year.

Which is how Maida Milone likes it.

“I’d rather it be quiet from an advertising perspective,” said Ms. Milone, head of reform group Pennsylvanians for Modern

Courts. “Negative ads about judicial candidates are incongruous to me.”

This November only one Supreme Court seat, currently held on an interim basis by Republican Sallie Mundy, is on the ballot. But Democrat Dwayne Woodruff, an Allegheny County family division judge and former Pittsburgh Steelers cornerback, has just $26,811 on hand, compared with Justice Mundy’s $420,292.

By contrast, by the same point in 2015, the three Democrats running for Supreme Court had an average of $713,532 on hand, compared with a $117,710 average for their Republican rivals.

Some observers say Judge Woodruff’s fundraising was hampered after his first 2017 financial report overstated receipts by more than $260,000. But Woodruff campaign manager Micah Sims said the discrepancy, first reported by political website PoliticsPA, was “a simple clerical error.”

“We knew going into the race that we’d be outspent,” he added. “We’ve done a good job of using every dollar effectively.”

In fact, some big-spending groups who financed the Democrats’ 2015 sweep are either reducing their profile or sharing support with Republicans.

Two years ago, for example, a committee tied to the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association spent $700,000 bankrolling “Pennsylvanians for Judicial Reform ,” an outside money group that at- tacked the GOP’s Supreme Court slate. This year, though, the association has so far contributed $150,000 to Justice Mundy, herself a onetime trial lawyer who was appointed by Gov. Tom Wolf to fill the seat vacated by Michael Eakin.

“Protecting the rights of people who have been hurt by another’s negligence isn’t a partisan issue, and that’s why we support both Republicans and Democrats,” said the Philadelphia association’s president, Larry Bendesky.

Indeed, the group is supporting Democrats and Republicans for Superior Court, where four seats are available, and Commonwealth Court, which hears disputes involving public agencies and where two seats are up for grabs.

Similarly, the Pennsylvania State Education Association, which rep- resents public-school teachers, gave nearly $300,000 to Pennsylvanians for Judicial Reform and the Democratic Supreme Court slate. (That investment arguably paid off last month, when PSEA-backed Justice David Wecht authored an opinion greenlighting a lawsuit alleging inadequate funding of education.) This year, PSEA is backing Justice Mundy, and splitting its lowercourt recommendations between parties.

In all, the four Democrats running for Superior Court have a combined $409,307 on hand, more than twice the GOP field’s total of $187,362.

But in the Commonwealth Court race, Republicans Paul Lally and Christine Fizzano Cannon boast a combined $728,161 — over four times the $165,286 posted by Irene Clark and Ellen Ceisler.

Thanks to the 2015 sweep, Democrats will have a 5-2 majority on the Supreme Court even if Justice Mundy wins, and they seem poised to control the top court for at least another decade.

The lower courts are both tilted toward Republicans, who hold an 8-5 majority on the Superior Court, and a 72 edge on Commonwealth Court.

Republicans see their improved fundraising as validating Chairman Val DiGiorgio's emphasis on offyear elections, and say Justice Mundy in particular has benefitted from a larger presence on direct mail, TV and online advertising.

While the GOP controls the legislature, said party spokesman Greg Manz, if legislation “go[es] before government union-controlled judges ... they run the risk of being overturned.”

Fundraising doesn’t tell the whole story. Republicans should benefit from the fact that, unlike in 2015, there is no Philadelphia mayoral race to boost turnout in that Democratic city. But Democrats may have an intangible asset, too, said veteran Franklin & Marshall College pollster Terry Madonna. “You would think the strong opposition to Donald Trump” — a factor that has boosted Democratic turnout in elections around the country this year — “would motivate Democrats to go to the polls,” he said.

Low-visibility judicial races “are a test of the generic political environment,” agreed Republican consultant Christopher Nicholas. In 1993 judicial elections, he said, Republicans did well “because everyone was freaking out over Hillarycare,” a failed health care overhaul effort undertaken early in the administration of President Bill Clinton.