Gerrymandering judge elections: Worst of politics

Not only did Republican lawmakers in Harrisburg kill any hope of passing redistricting reform in time for the 2020 census update, they are now supporting an effort to gerrymander the election of state judges, too.

Gerrymandering, like poison ivy encasing the trunk of a tree, prevents voters from tapping the heartwood of American democracy: Fair elections.

GOP leaders in the Legislature have set their sights on state judicial elections, hoping that fielding candidates from designated regions in the state will produce more Republican judges.

For decades, statewide judgeships — state Supreme, Superior and Commonwealth courts — have been filled by statewide election. As the Pennsylvania Constitution provides.

Of late, however, Democrats won a majority of seats on the state Supreme Court, and that has scrunched up Republican knickers in the seats of legislative power.

If GOP-led gerrymandering can produce intractable Republican majorities in the House and Senate, the thinking goes, why not try the same approach with the three state appellate courts?

Last week the state Senate started the process of amending the state Constitution to do just that. The House adopted the same amendment last year along party lines. A few Republicans jumped the fence, joining Democrats in voting no.

Thankfully, the process of amending the Constitution requires a second round of legislative approvals before it goes to the voters in a referendum. But that could well happen, if legislative Republicans retain majority control. The governor cannot veto a proposed constitutional amendment.

There are plenty of good reasons not to slice and dice Pennsylvania into judicial districts. The first is, look at the near-total entrenchment of incumbents and the iron-fisted leadership by Republicans in the Legislature, thanks to gerrymandering.

Of course, the judiciary isn’t free of politics. That will always be the case, whether judges are elected or appointed through a “merit” process.

But judges, thankfully, can act and rule relatively free of partisan pressure. Once elected, they face only 10-year retention votes. That makes for an offering of independence and the ability to act as a check on the other branches of government.

Statewide judicial elections are working as intended. If nothing else, they level the playing field along voters’ wishes and enable elected judges to counter some of the worst power grabs by insulated partisan legislators.

The 2018 state Supreme Court redrawing of one of the nation’s most gerrymandered congressional maps was a classic example.

This proposal, under the guise of spreading out judges geographically, has nothing to do with diversity on the bench or fairness. It’s revenge served cold, Harrisburg-style.

PPP loans bring hope

It was clear at the outset that healing the COVID-19 pandemic would take more than medicine. It would also require the injection of prodigious sums of cash to shore up an economy that slammed to a halt in the name of safety.

That is what the federal government’s Paycheck Protection Program promised. And now we have some understanding of what it delivered.

Nationwide, the Small Business Administration estimates that more than a half-trillion dollars in PPP loans went to 5 million small businesses. Nearly 87 percent of the loans were for less than $150,000.

Like any massive program hastily deployed, things were bound to get messy. Questions of conflict of interest and fairness hang over the loans. Money flowed to large companies that did not seem to meet the definition of small business.

One survey found 26% of minority business owners received part or all of the loans they sought. That is compared with 47% of PPP loan applications as a whole. It is part of what a business leader called a triple whammy. Minorities were hit harder by business closures and suffered a lower rate of loan approvals and higher rate of disease.

To obtain loan forgiveness, businesses must document that they spent the money according to the rules. Make those records public to guard against abuse and preserve public trust.

Clearly, more money will be needed to protect small businesses as virus cases mount and restrictions return. Monitor closely and communicate the PPP program payoff and, next time, make it better: more transparent and targeted to those most in need.