Pa. Delegation’s take on the looming shutdown

The federal government is getting close to possibly shutting down for the first time since 1996. If President Obama and Congressional leaders cannot come to an agreement full story

April 7, 2011 at 12:49 pm | Comments (5)

LEFTOVERS: Fundraising pleas, NRCC lifts Fitzpatrick, Biden/Pelosi details

It was the last day of the FEC fundraising quarter on Wednesday, which meant the typical batch of last-minute pleas from candidates seeking cash.

The morning started with an e-mail from Congresswoman Allyson Schwartz (D-13) on behalf of Manan Trivedi, the Democratic candidate in the 6th District. Schwartz had backed Trivedi’s opponent Doug Pike in the May primary, but now she was going to bat for Trivedi. “This district has been a challenge over these…

June 30, 2010 at 5:29 pm | Comments (7)

LEFTOVERS: Specter likes Kagan, Schwartz likes Specter, disability advocates like Hoeffel

Arlen Specter seems to be laying the ground work for a vote in favor of Elena Kagan’s confirmation to the Supreme Court. The blogosphere got into a tizzy when Kagan was nominated, given the fact that Specter voted against her confirmation as Solicitor General. full story

May 13, 2010 at 9:11 pm | Comments (27)

Chicago tactics from the Dems

Last week my pa2010.com colleague Beth Hegedus reported on

March 24, 2010 at 6:39 pm | Comments (12)

What’s going on in the 13th?

All three Republican candidates in the 13th Congressional District—Josh Quinter, Brian Haughton and Dee Adcock—have found their nominating petitions subjected to legal challenge.

And interestingly, all three challenges come from the same three people, according to public records: Sharon Boddy and Charles Gramlich of Abington Township, along with former Bryn Athyn Mayor Hyland Johns.

I realize that nominating petitions are challenged all the time, but here’s the skinny: If you check back in the Congressional…

March 19, 2010 at 9:53 am | Comments (12)

Two from Pa. heading ‘Red to Blue’

Two House Democrats from the Keystone State are helping to head up the party’s campaign efforts at capturing Republican-held seats.

Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-8) and Congresswoman Allyson Schwartz (D-13) were among four co-chairs of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “Red to Blue” program announced Monday. In addition to aiding challengers, the program also assists in open-seat races.

Congresswoman Donna Edwards (D-Md.) and Congressman Bruce Braley (D-Ia.) are also co-chairing the program.

“The DCCC is focused…

March 8, 2010 at 1:20 pm | Comments (4)

The ‘Matthews effect,’ the 13th District and the decline of the MontCo GOP

The Montgomery County GOP has endorsed pEarly comments on the vote have emphasized the so-called a href="http://writemarsh.blogspot.com/2010/02/mathews-effect-claims-its-latest-victim.html" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://writemarsh.blogspot.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fwritemarsh.blogspot.com%2F2010%2F02%2Fmathews-effect-claims-its-latest-victim.html','Matthews+Effect')" target="_blank">Matthews Effect,…

February 12, 2010 at 2:10 pm | Comments (3)

4 fun facts from the 4th quarter

About a week after fourth-quarter FEC reports hit the Web, here are some interesting items that caught our attention.

1. Spending on one’s own campaign is all the rage, and why not? Surely no one believes in a candidate as much as the candidate himself. Be they in-kind expenditures, direct donations or campaign loans, House candidates in Pennsylvania kicked more than $700,000 into their own races in late 2009, according to campaign finance data. There’s…

February 9, 2010 at 10:56 am | Comments (6)

Voting against the champs

As if the

November 7, 2009 at 6:25 pm | Comments (2)

CAMPAIGN FINANCE LEFTOVERS: Dahlkemper, Murphy, Schwartz & Thompson

In the hustle and bustle of covering third quarter campaign finance reports, we missed a handful of them.

So here’s a quick rundown of the fundraising hauls reported by incumbents from both parties.

Freshman Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper pSophomore Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-8) made some more headway in rebuilding a campaign war chest that was largely depleted after he spent heavily in the closing weeks before last year’s election, a href="http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/dcdev/forms/C00411991/436394/" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://query.nictusa.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fquery.nictusa.com%2Fcgi-bin%2Fdcdev%2Fforms%2FC00411991%2F436394%2F','raising+about+%24308%2C000')" target="_blank"raising about $308,000/a. He’s raised about $1.1 million during the cycle and has about $620,000 on hand./p
pCongresswoman Allyson Schwartz (D-13) a href="http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/dcdev/forms/C00389197/436281/" onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://query.nictusa.com']);return TrackClick("http%3A%2F%2Fquery.nictusa.com%2Fcgi-bin%2Fdcdev%2Fforms%2FC00389197%2F436281%2F','raised+about+%24231%2C000')" target="_blank">raised about $231,000, and has almost $2.6 million on hand, a sum that eclipses Republican opponent

October 18, 2009 at 1:01 am | Comments (3)