Hershey — After a heated campaign, the Pa. Republican Party has a new leader: Chester County GOP Chairman Val DiGiorgio.
He overcame GOP General Counsel Lawrence Tabas of Philadelphia by a nose, 173 votes to 171 in the official count. PoliticsPA will update with the confirmed final tally. One person abstained.
DiGiorgio will take over for Rob Gleason, who has served as Chair since 2006.
The morning began with candidates, Lawrence Tabas and Val DiGiorgio aggressively arguing over whether proxies were filed properly and if people were actually in attendance who had checked in. Over the course of the morning, the number of absences recorded went from 22, to four.
It turned out that every vote mattered: the roll call came almost to the end, with Westmoreland County’s delegation putting DiGiorgio over the edge.
“I decided to run with you in mind. To build a grassroots organization from the bottom up, to be in every county to talk to you on a regular basis and get your input and your counsel,” DiGiorgio said in his remarks.
Lawrence Tabas gave words of inspiration to DiGiorgio in brief remarks.
“Val, I know you will be a great leader,” Tabas said.
Tabas filed his official resignation as General Counsel this morning, his 14 year tenure ended at 9:31 this morning.
The day included elections for all of the leadership positions with the Party, the new Leadership team is listed below:
Vice Chair: Bernadette Comfort, Lehigh County
Treasurer: D Raja, Allegheny County
Secretary: Andy Reilly, Delaware County
Assistant Secretary: Peg Ferraro, Northampton County
The Party also voted to endorse for statewide judicial offices. The Party endorsed the following candidates:
Supreme Court (One vacancy):
Justice Sallie Updyke Mundy, Tioga County
Superior Court (Four vacancies):
Judge Emil A. Giordano, Northampton County
Judge Wade A. Kagarise, Blair County
Judge Paula A. Patrick, Philadelphia County
Craig W. Stedman, Lancaster County
Commonwealth Court (Two vacancies):
Judge Christine Fizzano Cannon, Delaware County
Paul N. Lalley, Allegheny County
Disclosure: The author formerly worked for the Pa. Republican Party.
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31 Responses
CarMato please please please take her Sincere Harris. Governor forced her on the state party. Please take her. She failed at her wolfie state job so he moved her to the party/. TAKE her Take her we will pack her bags
Dogg…I can’t tell you because it’s a secret. I can keep a secret, it’t the people I tell who can’t. I’ll let you know as soon as we are finished printing the rigged ballots. Otherwise, the crooked media might find out and charge us with spreading fake news and alternative facts.
OK, Chuckie. Tell us who is going to win this secret election? What will the vote count be? The official Family tally.
Congratulations Governor Shapiro
‘@ Guzzardi:
You can’t dismiss Trump/Toomey victories as anomalies.
Tito is right.
Do you think that Val’s first action will be to trade for the Democrats star staffer Sincere Harris? I heard that Groen is looking at a fire sale since they can’t pay their bills.
Congrats Val. And Thanks to Tabas for being a stand up individual after the results. Time to get ready for 2018 and work together after this difficult campaign.
Congratulations to Val DiGiorgio!
Time for GOP to unite and win the critical judgeships that will appear on this year’s ballot.
And to Glen: Trump lost all the Philadelphia collar counties, not just Chester County–mostly because DT was a much different candidate than Romney. It had nothing to do with DiGiorgio.
As a matter of fact, the only pro-Trump calls I received during the General election came from the Chester County GOP. I live in Montgomery County.
Dear Seneca, Truthier, Chuckie, Glen, and others who have similar points of view,
You sound like a bunch of Liberal Snowflakes complaining that you lost an election because the system was rigged, the other side is corrupt, Russians hacked a voice vote, waah, waah, waah.
You certainly would not be making these claims if your person won, which he almost did. Unfortunately for you, there are just people who disagree with your point of view and liked someone else slightly better. Those two guys will make peace and keep working together while you’ll still be on the outside looking in.
Get over it, close this internet window. (in fact, close out of the internet completely because no matter what you tell yourself, there is no such thing as Chics with Di#k$, just Dudes with Boobs and masturbation for more than 7 hours a day is unhealthy), walk out of your parents basement and go work a precinct. You probably need the exercise and fresh air.
@ Tito:
Your “prognostication” is based upon assumptions linked to the view that the D-registration edge will erode the GOP; The Donald promises to shake-up this viewpoint and, thus, reapportionment/redistricting won’t appreciably change in 4 years.
What difference does any of this make? The GOP will lose every statewide contest again this year. Trump, whether you like him or nor, is an anomaly. And Toomey used that, more money, and a really, really lame opponent. In no name elections (like the state rows, like the Supreme Court) the Rs will be crushed again this year. 0-fer. In a few years, there will be a census. New lines drawn. Couple years after that? The state GOP will go the way of the Philly and Montco GOP. A great pool would be “how many YEARs will it take before Val DiGeogio wins his first statewide election for a Republican?”
C’mon now, Chuckie, don’t spill too many beans. We have to keep up appearances, after all. Back rooms for dealmaking usually need a pretty facade.
Thanks for the catch Douglas
Gleason has been chairman a lot longer than ‘since 2016’
OK, Val. Time to do your Trump dance and pay the piper.
Does that include rich mobsters?
Independent of the Godfather’s orders, I have to call all of you partisans “morons” because you can’t see that the system is bought from top to bottom. La Familia candidates are largely Democrat but Republican top tier white guys love us. That is how we just missed the scotus pick, even though the the white guys screwed us. Maybe it was our own fault for marrying with an Irishman…white guys don’t like them either. My own idea…kill the rich.
Good on Val. Time to live the dream. He’s going to be very busy, starting now. The big test will be 2018, as PA Republicans will expect his absolute best and utmost to oust Wolf and Casey. Whatever happens, he’s likely to get more than a few grey hairs out of his chairmanship.
La Famiglia doesn’t play in this game. Republican or Democrat, we just buy off the winner. It’s good for business and politics. The chumps who vote are simply pawns. Let’s toast the system with another bond issue.
Congraduations Val and you will be a great Republican Chairperson in Pennsylvania.
Trump is a dangerous liar.
Whew for a second there I thought Wagner had a chance at Governor. Congratulations AG Shapiro and Tom Wolf. This is a huge win for Democrats.
Malicious gossip is everything Trump says when he opens his mouth. The new guy sounds like a gem, nothing matters except money. Exactly what Trump believes.
Glen: You most likely have never been to ChesCo so I forgive you for fundamentally misunderstanding what the demographics are and why Trump lost there. Val worked hard for Trump and significantly lessened the damage Hillary could have done there. All you keyboard warriors who think he was a “never trumpet” need to do your homework and not repeat malicious gossip.
This is good news for the party. Val will get the job done on fundraising, which is the only thing that remotely matters for the state party chair in PA.
This is not comploicated folks. Tabas lost because of his ARROGANCE. It goes back to even before 1982 when he ran for the State Legislature the in 182nd district in Philadelphia. He had so many opportunities to do simple things over the years to make friends, but he never missed an opportunity to blow it. His arrogance got in the way. The defeat of Tabas will hopefully be the final ending of the Philadelphia GOP old guard that ran the local party structure into the ground.
Jerry Morgan will be looking for a job now. He is such a creepy little fellow, maybe he can sell used cars for his loser former boss Don Sherwood?
Tabas was a class act after losing.
And so the NeverTrumper wins it. Trump lost Chester County by nearly 30000 votes. Romney won the County in 2012.
Do the math.
How many elections has Tabas lost in his career? 7?
So close and yet so far.