Pennsylvania voters — by a clear margin — supported Joe Biden, over Donald Trump, in the 2020 presidential election. But Pennsylvania U.S. Senate candidates Jeff Bartos, Sean Parnell, and Carla Sands have each cast doubt on the results of the election and/or actively advocated for undermining Pennsylvanians’ votes, and now a state GOP lawmaker is echoing their rhetoric and actively beginning efforts for a sham “audit.”
According to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star:
A Republican state senator close to former President Donald Trump has announced he will pursue a legislative audit of the 2020 election in Pennsylvania.
Sen. Doug Mastriano, R-Franklin, said Wednesday that he had sent letters to “several counties” asking for “information and materials” needed to conduct a “forensic investigation” of the 2020 general election and the 2021 primary.
Mastriano’s push follows Bartos, Sands, and Parnell’s own vocal efforts to undermine the Pennsylvania voters they are ostensibly running to represent in the U.S. Senate:
- Jeff Bartos has said, “We need a full forensic audit in all the states where we had issues.”
- Carla Sands falsely claimed that her Pennsylvania absentee ballot was not counted in the 2020 election, in service of casting doubt on the results of the election. A New York Times investigation determined that Sands’ vote was, in fact, counted.
- Sean Parnell, who was on the ballot in 2020, has vocally pushed an audit in Pennsylvania, amplified election conspiracy theories on Twitter, and, without evidence, claimed that the Pennsylvania election was not “free and fair” due to “corruption”
Retiring GOP Sen. Pat Toomey has warned Republican candidates “not [to center their campaigns] on allegiance to a man.”
But as Bartos, Sands, and Parnell continue to ratchet up their negative primary campaigns, they’re standing united behind the idea of undermining Pennsylvania voters in order to put partisanship and Donald Trump first, above all else.
Published: Jul 7, 2021