Calls grow for Gale’s resignation
Nine more elected officials in the region have added their names to the list of people calling for the resignation of Montgomery County Commissioner Joe Gale.
On June 18, eight members of the Pottstown School Board signed a letter asking Gale to “voluntarily resign.”
Board member Steve Kline said he could not sign because he works for Montgomery County and signing the letter, written by Vice President Katina Bearden, would be a conflict of interest for him.
On June 20, Limerick Township Supervisor Patrick Morroney issued a similar statement in the wake of the board of supervisors’ refusal to take the matter up for discussion and possible action at the June 16 meeting.
Ever since June 1, when Republican Gale issued a “press statement” condemning the Black Lives Matter activist group as a “radical left-wing hate group” that “perpetrates urban domestic terror,” he has faced a storm of protest from elected officials and citizens alike.
As the protests have grown, both outside the county courthouse in Norristown and at Gale’s home, some counter-protesters have also emerged to support Gale, particularly since he pivoted and added the issue of abortion to the defense of his original statement.
Noting that Gale was elected to represent 83,000 people on a platform of “people before politics,” the school board letter notes that Gale is failing to represent the diverse population of the county and is “putting politics before people.”
“Calling Black Lives Matter a hate group tells the public you have not performed your due diligence to become knowledgeable about its roots or its mission,” the school board letter reads.
Black Lives Matter is “a multicultural organization united to speak against hate, racism and egregious acts of violence against black and brown lives,” according to the letter. “Black men and women, your constituents, are being murdered by the common defense group put in place to protect them.”
Gale’s language “does not promote general welfare or tranquility, it incites anger and division,” Bearden wrote.
The school board’s letter echoes one issued in early June by Pottstown Borough Council, which also called on Gale to resign as a result of his statement.
At that meeting, Pottstown Mayor Stephanie Henrick read a letter calling Gale’s statement “divisive” and signed by the mayors of Pottstown, Royersford, Conshohocken, West Conshohocken, Narberth, Collegeville, Hatboro, Lansdale and Ambler.
“I believe it is incumbent upon elected officials to speak out on issues of concern to the people they serve,” Morroney wrote in his statement.
“County Commissioner Joe Gale’s recent statements about the Black Lives Matters movement present an opportunity for those of us on the Limerick Board of Supervisors to let our constituents know where we stand,” he wrote.
“Many township boards and school boards across Montgomery County have issued bipartisan statements of condemnation of Commissioner Gale’s comments and calls for his resignation, Morroney wrote. “I had hoped that the Limerick Board could similarly reach consensus on a statement of condemnation.”
At that meeting, which was marked by no small degree of shouting, much of it on Morroney’s part, Neafcy said it requires three votes of the five-member board to put something on the agenda.
Morroney is the board’s only Democrat and Neafy is as a Republican for the state House’s 146th district seat.
Neafcy replied to a group of speakers, most of whom are members of the area’s Democratic Committee, that “Mr. Gale is responsible for his own words, you should take the issue up with him at the next county commissioners meeting.”
He also called the comments and Morroney’s outbursts “a political circus.”
In his statement, Morroney wrote that with the board’s unwillingness to address Gale’s statement, he decided to “make my own position clear. Commissioner Gale’s recent comments were reprehensible. Such expressions of hate and intolerance have no place in a civil society and are particularly disturbing coming from anyone in a position of leadership. He should resign!”
Gale has consistently rebuffed all calls for him to resign, saying he was elected and will serve his term. In the last election, Gale collected 74,023 votes according to official Montgomery County vote tallies.
As of Friday afternoon, nearly 87,000 people had signed a petition on Change.org calling on Gale to resign.
State Sen. Daylin Leach, D-17th Dist., has introduced a Senate resolution which creates a special committee to investigate whether Gale’s statement violated the law, ethics rules, or policies under Article VI, Section 7, of the Pennsylvania Constitution.
Gale responded by saying “there is nothing illegal, unethical, or improper about exercising my constitutional rights to free speech. Sen. Leach’s gross mischaracterization of my statement — which discussed the rioting and looting in Philadelphia, not the peaceful protests — is a desperate attempt for relevancy by a failed leader who was just rejected by his own party’s voters in this year’s Democrat primary.”
“Calling Black Lives Matter a hate group tells the public you have not performed your due diligence to become knowledgeable about its roots or its mission.”
— Pottstown School Board letter