Pennsylvania House of Representatives

And on Tuesday, we brought it into the present with a discussion on Starlink and Starshield.

Today, Thursday, we close the week with a living voice and a candidate for the Pennsylvania House of Representatives.

If you want the long version underneath this conversation with every source in the end notes, the article itself is free at consequentialactions.com slash subscribe.

And a new one arrives every Sunday.

Our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury.

My guests this week reached the ballot by petition.

Chris Gambino is an independent candidate for the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in the 143rd District in Bucks County.

His nomination papers were challenged, and the Commonwealth Court and then the Pennsylvania Supreme Court kept him on the ballot.

Do they come out or not? And the new voters, what do they do? And do they actually vote?

Democrats already control the state House and the fight to control the state Senate will be decided in the eastern part of the state.

But Democrats say the political climate could add to their House majority by helping flip some traditionally Republican-held seats into in parts of western PA where they have not been successful in the past.

Tom Reese from our friends at WESA reports discontent with Donald Trump may play a big role.

Political newcomer John Lloyd says Democrats are finally getting serious about Statehouse District 40, which includes Bethel Park, Upper St. Clair, and Peters Township.

Lloyd says Democrats have fielded candidates before.

However, they've all either entered the race very late or haven't fortunately been super viable candidates from a state support level.

The state Democratic Party and House campaign committee has thrown nearly $90,000 into Lloyd's race, while the last challenger only raised about $500.

I really am.

I think the most likely outcome in the federal elections this midterms is some form of shared government, split government, right? Republicans obviously control the White House.

That will remain the case.

I think it seems likely the Democrats will control one or both chambers of Congress.

Not a lot of big legislation gets passed.

But here in Pennsylvania...

The race for the state House and the state Senate could be super duper consequential because if Josh Shapiro holds on to the governor's mansion, as polls suggest he will, and Democrats can win both chambers, they will have what's called a trifecta, which means they will be able to potentially pass and sign into law policy initiatives that have been sitting on the back burner literally for decades.

We're talking about minimum wage, climate action, marijuana reform, things that because Harrisburg is often governed.

E-scooters are only getting more and more prevalent, so doing nothing to address this only means that things stay exactly as they are, not that they get any better.

A bill that would have allowed e-scooters for riders 16 and older set speed limits and other guidelines easily past the Pennsylvania House 176-27, but with only two session days left on the state senate's calendar, there's not enough time for it to get through that chamber.

Kincaid says in addition to age and speed restrictions,

There are mechanisms that allow our police and law enforcement to actually be able to hold people accountable when they are breaking these rules.

So like in the lead up to election day, you can't run deep fakes.

And there is a bill that the Pennsylvania State House approved that puts some restriction on deepfake campaign ads, but it has not, as of now, been approved in the Senate.

So right now there aren't really limitations, which I think leads us to this AI-generated attack ad from the Garrity campaign.

Megan Cullen, have you seen this yet? No.

So this is Trump, I believe, and Dan Borowski has been looking at this.

I mean, he has gone on quite a storm lately, putting out social media as well as the White House press office, talking about, for example, he's released – or under his direction, releasing and freeing more than 100 hostages, just to give you one example.

But 13, you think of this, how many days, less than a week to a midterm election? And where is he today? I'm trying to look at, I know he just announced he was going to go to Mississippi, Iowa.

But what concerns me is that he's going to red, traditionally red states.

Yeah.

I don't know how the heck this guy does this.

8 a.m., President participates in executive time in the White House, closed to press.

11 a.m., President receives his intelligence briefing at the White House.