Kathleen Kane is facing a trial and possible suspension of her law license. In the past she has faced impeachment threats. Now she may soon be dealing with another effort to remove her from office.
According to John Baer of the Daily News, the State Senate is exploring a method that would allow them to recommend that Gov. Wolf expel Attorney General Kathleen Kane.
Article VI, Section 7 of the PA Constitution states that an elected official (the Governor, Lt. Governor, members of the legislature and judges, though, are exempt from this provision) “shall be removed by the Governor for reasonable cause, after due notice and full hearing, on the address of two-thirds of the Senate.”
Baer reports that Drew Compton, counsel to Senate President Joe Scarnati, said the chamber is in “the preliminary stages” of such a maneuver. Compton also indicated that a suspension of Kane’s law license would likely expedite the process.
Of course, there are still a myriad of legal questions. For instance, what would “due notice and full hearing” constitute?
Nevertheless, the Governor’s spokesman Jeffrey Sheridan said that if this should happen “the governor would certainly listen to what the Senate has to say.”
Gov. Wolf has already called for Kane to resign.
Overall, this method would effectively be an impeachment without the involvement of the State House. Therefore, this avenue would be quicker and could make it more attractive to those that believe Kane can no longer serve.
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36 Responses
Josh, it would seem that Fina and Costanzo have been spending a good part of their time attacking Kane … all on the City’s dime … on the dime of the blacks and women they have no respect for. They need to go too, right?
By the way – your attack on DD exposes you – as does your use of “Kalamity.”
Kane will probably “go” when there is another election. The smear campaign and relentless attacks have been more than untoward. And now that we know the reasons behind the smear campaign and attacks, there are MANY reasonable observers (not just DD) who feel that people like Fina and Costanzo are just as bad for law enforcement as (maybe worse than) Kane.
Kalamity Kane must go. Who cares what party she belongs to? Just retaining her indicted staff is a bad enough violation of law to seriously damage her. She cannot do the job of AG while spending 99% of her day defending herself. And how does the writer of this article dream up the word “maneuver” to describe a constitutional act? Maneuvers are by definition crafty. When you’ve got a bull in a china shop like Kane, crafty don’t work. You need the cowboys with lassos to rope and haul off the crazy animal. And I’m still shaking my head over David Diano, whose partisanship gets him kudos among fall-on-the-sword partisan hacks, but among the rank and file citizenry he looks and sounds silly.
The Senate should remove itself for M.I.A. on the budget. They should worry about their own activities and corrupt behavior before blaming AG Kane.
Larry-
They are told what opinion to have when they get the first check before they are even elected.
Diano, there you go, you’re starting to get closer to something that might support your allegation of corruption. But you’re not there yet. To get to “corruption,” you have to prove (that’s right, with facts) that the legislator was in favor of a shale tax and then changed his or her mind because of campaign contributions, and not because he or his constituents actually believed that the impact fee was sufficient. Keep trying to sound credible, you might just get there.
Larry-
Every elected official against the shale tax, who took money from oil/gas industry.
WOW !!!!
The practice of the House & Senate exempting themselves (include the Judges so don’t lose in court)from everything (different pensions, pay raises, health benefits, budget money, budget impasse rules, vacations etc.) has got to stop. Now they want to overturn election’s !!!
Two Words TERM LIMITS !!!!!
http://m.citizensvoice.com/news/ag-pays-5k-for-janitor-to-travel-to-harrisburg-1.1942611
The AG is a neat lady who should run for governor in 2018.
Diano, as I suspected, you throw around accusations of Republican corruption, I ask you for details, and you cannot even identify a category of corruption, let alone supplying facts to support your deeply held conclusions. “Quid pro quo” arrangements? Like what? I’m not aware of any, but surely you are since you believe so strongly that it is happening. You’re a cartoon. All kinds of wild opinions that you dreamed up in your head. When you’re ready to join the rest of us in the real world, you better come prepared or else you will continue to be a fringe element like Andy Ostrowski and the handful of crazies who showed up for the Kane “rally.”
DD — Speaking as a D who voted for, raised and donated money, and continues to support Wolf, his removal of KK will be the most meaningful, decisive action he’s taken as Govenor. The notion that such action will be met with resistance from the party demonstrates your tangential relationship with reality.
Ryan-
Pot has not been legalized in PA, so please put the bong down before you post.
The PA “standards” for corruption are:
1) A judge getting kickback for selling out kids for cash
President Judge Mark Ciavarella and Senior Judge Michael Conahan were convicted for racketeering, fraud, money laundering, extortion, bribery, and federal tax violations.
2) And how about Vince Fumo:
“On February 6, 2007, a Federal grand jury named Fumo in a 137 count indictment, alleging mail fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy, obstruction of justice and filing a false tax return. Charges include using state workers to oversee construction of his mansion, spying on his ex-wife, and work on his farm. Additionally, the indictment accused him of misusing $1 million of state funds and $1 million from his charity for personal and campaign use and commandeering yachts from the Philadelphia Seaport Museum for personal travel.”
3) All the no show jobs for friends and family
4) All the elected officials taking money from the oil and gas industry to ignore obvious pollution and health dangers.
5) Letting a pedophile run free because of his political connections.
Kane hasn’t come ANYWHERE close to this.
Despite all the whining of a partisan conspiracy, Wolf seems to be more than willing to remove Kane from office if given the chance. This is not some plot by the “evil” Republicans, but a bipartisan effort to remove a deranged, grossly incompetent and corrupt official (even by Pennsylvania standards) from office.
Larry, The Chester County Republican Lawyers plot and plan and the Democrat Lawyers play their scripted assigned parts…..just one big CABAL GAME. Former GOP State and County Chair: Lawyer; Strategic Advisor, Lobbyist, Deputy DA, Lawyer for many Chester County municipalities along with Chester County Judge of Disciplinary proceedings, DA, Lawyer for many Chester County municipalities……AG Corbett was theirs as was Gov. Corbett was theirs! PCN TV at Agriculture Republicans filmed meeting; Corbett thanked Novak and Elam Herr, Pennsylvania State Assoc. of Township Supervisor for their help. Power and Greed….Control Network of Lawyers. The Liberty Bell in PA rings with public, white collar corruption, official collusion, abuse of power, etc., etc. Scarnati and Turzi are their puppets. Costa I trust. Kane should have her day in court and it should be televised by PCN TV. The GOP operatives control all life in Chester County and did control the State via Corbett, Carol Aichle and Steve Aichle also female overseeing unemployment labor department. They oversee school boards and all municipalities, creating legal matters, writing their own checks. They must get Kane out of the way and then it will be Wolf.
Larry-
No. It’s detrimental to Wolf because it’s one more concession to the senate GOP which already has his balls in a vise.
Larry, just record your daily tasks and quid-pro-quo arrangements you encounter. (That’s the stuff you were told in school not to do, then ignored when you became a lawyer and saw everyone getting away with it.)
Shame, shame, shame, if the Democrats are involved. Again I say, the Democrats tend to eat their own. Give Attorney General Kane her day in court. Between the media and the Republicans, she is not getting a fair deal. I for one, support her 100% and know when all the facts are in the open, she will be vindicated.
Justice Joe, what does Chester County have to do with anything related to Kane? Also, how do you reconcile your tinfoil-hat-wearing and howling at the moon with the fact that Kane’s own Democrats testified against her and are orchestrating her departure from office?
Kathleen Kane is a victim of a strategically set-up OF PA GOP Lawyers BY GOP Judges and DA’s and Media scripted for regaining their GOP POWER and CONTROL. This CONSPIRACY OF Chester County LAWYERS and WEALTH of Business and Industry and Economic Development are addicts of power and greed; they have corrupted our communities and our courts. Their agenda is power and greed. Pennsylvania now has an oligarchy plutocracy in place by GOP Lawyers who control all elections, employment, religious organizations, banks, municipalities and boroughs. Scarnati is their puppet. Wolf better wake-up and smell the corruption, he is undoubtedly next on their hit list!
Montco PA Dem, why are you shocked that the PA SC would playing a political game? They do it all the time. Of course, it is outrageous, but so are many of their decisions, and NON-decisions of evading any real responsibility to supervise their underling courts when they go off the rails or commit unethical acts.
Montco Dem, I don’t think the Supreme Court is part of the coordination. That would be outrageous.
So wait, the Senate is coordinating with Supreme Court? If true (which I doubt), that’s outrageous.
David, if removing Kane would be so detrimental to Wolf, then it stands to reason that Kane is well on her way to being re-elected. Is that what you think?
And, pray tell, what specific acts of corruption should I be on the look-out for? I’ll start taking notes if you can give me specifics, and not sweeping generalizations about special interests (as the Dems have their own). Also, is this really just you being butthurt because of all the Dems getting arrested for blatant criminality?
If Wolf is really interested in being a one-term Governor, then removing Kane is one more nail in that political coffin.
This is happening. Not conjecture. Not gossip. It’s in the works and being coordinated as we speak.
1.) The SC will suspend her license.
2.) She will refuse to vacate the office.
3.) The Senate and Wolf will remove her pursuant to the state constitution.
After 32 years of Republican control of the Office of the Attorney General, what do you expect? They want their power and control back.
Did former Republican Senate Leaders investigate political activities inside their own caucus and stop the illegal actions? No. Did the former Republican controlled Office of the Attorney General investigate illegal political activities inside the Republican caucus of the Senate? No. The Republican Senate Leaders simply want to go back to the good old days of laissez faire.
What goes around, comes around. Payback can be ugly.
Larry-
Actually, this weekend, I was in Gettysburg for the fall state committee meeting, and a lot of people thanked me for my support of Kane against this Republican railroading.
But, Larry, you seem to be part of the daily corruption in the capitol yourself. You claim to be a lawyer, but as an “officer of the court”, you should be so busy turning in Republican legislators for corruption, you shouldn’t even have time to post here.
And, given your timestamps of 11:10am and 12:51pm, you seem to be posting during your “billable hours”. Hardly surprising.
KSDF, I agree with you. Let Kane stay in as long as possible.
David, all available evidence shows that (1) she failed to address any alleged “old boys club” and (2) despite, using that as her excuse for incompetence, she has been a terrible manager of an agency (not grounds for removal) and almost certainly committed criminal acts (grounds for removal). You won’t concede any of this — despite abundant evidence — only because she’s a Democrat (even though Democrats are testifying against her). Hell, I’m surprised your buddies at state party (do they even know who you are?) haven’t told you about Kane’s first days in office. You know, when they sent very experienced Dems who ran similar offices to tell her how it’s done, and Kane (who hadn’t even practiced law for 7 years) told them she already knew everything they were telling her. The Dems were pretty sure then and there that her administration would be a disaster.
Republicans should just kick back, let Kane embarrass the Democrats, and then pick up the row offices in 2016. Don’t let them rip off the band-aid now by her ouster and replacement.
“make it more attractive to those that believe Kane can no longer serve.”
Rather, for those who don’t want her to server, because she’s exposing their misbehavior and connections.
This would be a monstrous overstep and a huge mistake. Wolf and any Dems involved need to walk away from this.
Why don’t the Senate remove themselves from office,and go get a real job.
Larry-
She has NOT acted “so contrary to the purposes for which she was elected”. She’s doing what we elected her to do: clean house and expose the old boys club.
It’s the Republican senators taking action (with the aid of a few Dems without the political courage to let the court case play out).
David, Wolf has already identified the person who will take her place. The Senate Dems are on board. Overturn an election? Did you feel the same way about Nixon after Watergate? When an official acts so contrary to the purposes for which she was elected, the remaining elected officials can and should act to remove that official. It’s still people elected by the people who are taking action. If you think the Dems are not involved with this, you are being naïve.
More proof that the Republicans want to overturn an election (without Kane getting due process).
If Wolf lets them get away with this, he weakens his bargaining positions with them even further (unless this is Wolf’s way of throwing Kane under the bus to cut a budget deal).
Kierran Young and David Diano would both be solid choices to replace Kane.
The Governor is obviously working with the Senate on this, and it’s not just the Republicans.