Use of decade-old district lines in this year’s election for seats in the Pennsylvania General Assembly is permissible as an emergency measure, a federal judge has ruled.
U.S. District Court Judge R. Barclay Surrick of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania ruled Wednesday that the public interest in an orderly election process requires that the state remain on track to hold its primary election on April 24. In so holding, Surrick rejected requests for injunctive relief led by state Rep. Samuel H. Smith, R-Jefferson, the speaker of the state House of Representatives, and Sen. Dominic Pileggi, R-Delaware, the majority leader in the state Senate. In three cases, consolidated under the caption Pileggi v. Aichele , Surrick refused to delay the primary election in order for the state’s 2011 Legislative Reapportionment Commission to come up with a response to the state Supreme Court’s decision to reject its new lines for districts in the state House and Senate.
