2 weeks Ago
Judging by Dave Sunday’s speech at the Pennsylvania Press Club on Monday, the state attorney general’s race has in many ways come down to the civil versus criminal side of the legal profession. Sunday, the Republican candidate to be the state’s top law enforcement official, spoke at Monday’s luncheon in Harrisburg with just a week to go before voters weigh in on the contest between him and Democrat Eugene DePasquale . As he has previously, Sunday stressed his extensive resume as a prosecutor as well as a reformer in how law enforcement handles addiction and mental health , painting himself as one of the most qualified men in the state to take on drug traffickers and gang members.
“If something happens where someone dies, you can’t fix that,” Sunday said. “That’s why I’m so passionate about this.” “I’m running because I feel that this is mission-based with regard to public safety,” Sunday continued.
“I’m not running for a different title, I’m running to do this job. I’m the chief prosecutor of a county running to be the state’s top prosecutor.” As he recounted during his press club speech, Sunday joined the Navy as a young man and later worked his way through college and law school, eventually joining the York County District Attorney’s office and working his way up through the organization as a criminal prosecutor.
He was elected to lead the office in 2017, and by his own count has handled over 20 first-degree murder jury trials. DePasquale, on the other hand, is a former state representative and two-term Pennsylvania auditor general known for leading investigations into environmental enforcement, rape kit backlogs, funding misappropriations, and a long list of other matters that speak more toward civil litigation. “We’re just different people, it’s like a tale of two lawyers.
You have one who came through a courthouse to get here, and you have one who came through Harrisburg,” Sunday said. While acknowledging that there are “very complex civil things, actions that take place in the AG’s office that are important,” Sunday reiterated that he believes the office should be headed by a courtroom prosecutor “When I talk about the fact that if our community is not safe, nothing else matters, it’s through that lens,” Sunday said of his front-line experience dealing with the opioid epidemic. “I think we’re in a place where we need a prosecutor to do that job.
” Sunday spent considerable time during his address discussing his philosophy on dealing with drug-related crime and the opioid addiction crisis, saying that “not only did we hammer drug traffickers, but we did everything we would to get people into treatment.” York County’s overdose death rate receded even as it continued to grow elsewhere, Sunday said, something he attributed in part to initiatives such as having addiction and mental health co-responders accompany police in order to have a “warm handoff” into treatment. His office also worked closely on second-chance programs to help those coming out of incarceration find work, reducing recidivism and relapse, Sunday said.
Asked about race relations, he also highlighted a joint program with Black ministers formed in the wake of the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests. The City of York’s gun crime rate plummeted last year due to what Sunday described as a combination of both tough enforcement and social intervention initiatives, and “those are incredibly powerful numbers,” he said. The complicating factor to this record is the national political landscape.
Speaking with reporters Monday afternoon, Sunday said he is doing everything he can to run his own race. “The top of the ticket definitely impacts it by setting the tone with voters across the state, but what I have done is I have campaigned sort of outside of that,” Sunday said. “We run our own race, is what it comes down to.
I campaign about the issues that are important to me.” But there are two areas in particular where it’s difficult for Sunday to avoid the minefield laid by his own party’s presidential candidate, Donald Trump — abortion and elections — both of which he was questioned about during Monday’s event. Sunday was asked specifically if he would enforce a law prohibiting abortion in Pennsylvania, something that is legally possible since Trump’s appointees to the U.
S. Supreme Court overturned precedents on abortion rights. “There is no set of circumstances that exist where I would ever prosecute a woman for getting an abortion,” Sunday said, without expounding on how he would approach the inevitable civil litigation involved in any attempt to stop abortion procedures.
“I don’t see any world that exists where the will of the people in Pennsylvania would ever do that,” Sunday said of an abortion ban. “To start throwing hypotheticals out is something that I just think is counterproductive.” Trump, similarly, said during last month’s debate that he would not be signing a national abortion ban, but also repeatedly refused to say if he would actually veto such a measure if conservatives in Congress passed one.
Sunday was also asked if he would’ve done anything differently in 2020 when then-attorney general and current Governor Josh Shapiro defended Pennsylvania’s elections against dozens of suits brought by the Trump campaign — many of them based on false claims that resulted in disciplinary action against the former president’s attorneys. Sunday responded by focusing on efforts to prevent disruptions at polling places, and said that “regardless of who wins or loses, the other side has to accept it and move on.” Asked after the event if he had given any consideration to the constitutional questions that Shapiro fielded in the wake of Trump’s attempts to overturn the election, Sunday didn’t elaborate, saying only that he would follow the law.
“Just like I would any other law, we will defend the laws of the commonwealth regardless of the outcome of the election,” Sunday said. “These are so factually nuanced circumstances that I would want to wait” to speculate on legal strategy, he continued, but “what I can say is I will defend the laws of Pennsylvania.” DePasquale’s campaign has used such responses to try to paint Sunday as unwilling or unable to delve into the intricate civil rights questions that would surround any future abortion changes or election challenges, issues that are major drivers for Democratic-leaning voters.
Tomorrow – Oct. 29 – is the last day in Pennsylvania to request a mail-in ballot for the Nov. 5 election.
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