There are 203 seats in the Pennsylvania State House of Representatives. Unless something extraordinary happens, it’s safe to say that Republicans have won 101 seats and Democrats have won 100. That leaves two seats unresolved. To take control of the House, Republicans only need one of the two, while Democrats have to sweep both of them.
The two seats in question are the 151st District in Montgomery County, and the 142nd District in Bucks County. It appears that Democrats have an edge in the 151st. That leaves the 142nd in Bucks to determine whether Democrats or Republicans will control the Pennsylvania House for the next two years.
In the 151st, Democrat Missy Cerrato trails incumbent Republican Todd Stephens by 26 votes. However, The Bucks County Courrier Times reported today that “All but 1,566 of the 10,997 mail-in ballots cast in the race have been counted with most votes going to Cerrato.” If that’s true, Cerrato should have no trouble picking up far more than the 26 votes that she is currently trailing by.
The 142nd is an open seat where Democrat Mark Moffa leads Republican Joseph Hogan by two votes. You read that correctly – TWO VOTES.
Here’s where it gets tricky. The Courrier wrote, “County officials estimate there are approximately 156 segregated mail-in or absentee ballots, 275 provisional ballots and 32 military and overseas ballots are from precincts within the 142nd district.”
The Courrier didn’t say how many, if any, regular mail ballots remain to be counted in the 142nd, probably because they don’t know how many there are. And it’s possible that there aren’t any more regular mail ballots remaining to be counted in the 142nd.
In last State House election, Frank Farry, the Republican candidate in the 2020 version of 142nd District (which is close to but not precisely the same as the 2022 model), got 373 Provisional votes, as compared to the 202 that Democrat Malinda Lareau received. So if there are just a handful, or if there are no regular mail votes left to count in the 142nd, that doesn’t bode well for Moffa.
In a press release today, the Bucks County Board of Elections reported that “about 5,500 ballots remain outstanding from the Nov. 8 General Election [For all of Bucks County].” The Board of Elections accounted for those 5,500 ballots as follows –
Known outstanding ballots include approximately 1,735 segregated mail-in/absentee ballots and 3,171 provisional ballots received from polling places.
Segregated ballots include those with missing signatures, dates, secrecy envelopes and other issues.
Up to 653 overseas civilian, federal and military ballots also remain to be counted. Of those 420 had been returned by Thursday afternoon. To be counted, those ballots must be received by the Board of Elections by 5 p.m. Tuesday, Nov. 15.
They made no mention of any regular uncounted mail ballots.
That leaves two paths by which Moffa can win the 142nd District, and by which Democrats can take control of the Pennsylvania House.
- A Court could rule that Bucks County has to count the 1,735 segregated mail ballots.
- Moffa could get enough of the Provisional/Military votes to hold onto his lead. That’s not as much of a reach as you might think. In 2020, Republican Farry got 61.18% of the total vote. Farry won 64.9% of the Provisional vote. If Democrats get as much of a pickup from the provisional vote as they got from all the votes counted so far this year, then you can’t rule out the possibility that they might pull this one out.
Bottom Line
Based on what we know right now, it’s not impossible for Democrats to win that 102nd seat and take control of the Pennsylvania House, but don’t bet your house on it.
The Inquirer has D 101, R 100 with 2 outstanding, not D 100, R101.
https://www.inquirer.com/politics/election/inq2/pennsylvania-election-results-2022-senate-house-race-20221108.html
Also, given the over-performance of Democrats across the state in 2022, there’s no reason to assume the 2020 pattern for provisional ballots would hold in 2022.
If it turns out that most of those provisional ballots are for people who never got or messed up their VBM ballots in some way, including “canceled” ballots for lack of a secrecy envelope or signature/date issue, they could easily lean D.
You are correct about D’s leading 101-100 and not R’s. Furthermore, unlike in the 142nd where there may or may not be Un-Segregated Mail Ballots, it appears that there are more than enough of them in the 151st for Missy Cerrato to take the lead. So Dems don’t even need the 142nd to take control of the House.
https://thisislowermerion.com/now-it-looks-like-dems-have-flipped-the-pa-house/