Ziccarelli asks state Senate to overturn Brewster victory

New Kensington lawyer Nicole Ziccarelli will ask the Republican-controlled state Senate to reject state certification and overturn the re-election of incumbent Democrat Jim Brewster in the 45th District.

The district includes parts of Westmoreland and Allegheny counties, and that fact is central to the disputed election results.

According to official, state-certified results, Brewster of McKeesport, won his third full four-year term in November with a 69-vote victory over Ziccarelli.

But the Republican challenger contends the win was awarded to the Democratic incumbent through a “blatantly political maneuver” to count what she called hundreds of illegally cast ballots in Allegheny County.

Brewster and other members elected to the Senate in November are slated to be sworn in on Tuesday.

“To remedy this issue, we humbly ask the state Senate to consider the facts regarding these actions, refuse to accept the (Pennsylvania) Secretary of State’s invalid certification, and finally decide the race using only lawfully cast ballots,” Ziccarelli said in a news released issued this weekend. “If this relief is granted, it would not only validate our campaign’s victory. It would help to restore faith in our electoral process, ensure all voters in the 45th State Senatorial District are treated equally and fairly, and validate the rule of law.”

Ziccarelli claims the Allegheny County Board of Elections counted more than 2,300 mail-in ballots not properly dated, including 311 from the 45th Senate District.

That gave Brewster an additional margin of 94 votes.

Exclusion of those ballots would give Ziccarelli a 25-vote victory, she contends.

Westmoreland County’s Republican-controlled elections board in November, at the Ziccarelli campaign’s request, refused to count mail-in ballots that contained technical errors such as incorrect dates handwritten on envelopes submitted by voters.

Ziccarelli campaign lawyer Matt Haverstick said Saturday that a formal challenge to the certification was sent late Friday to secretary of the state Senate.

“If our petition is granted, Brewster would not be seated and Nicole would be declared the winner,” Haverstick said.

Jennifer Kocher, spokeswoman for Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman, confirmed on Saturday that Ziccarelli’s petition to contest the certification was received and is being reviewed. She said Corman also informed Senate majority leader Kim Ward, R-Hempfield, and minority leader Jay Costa, D-Forest Hills, about the petition.

Ward, who is also slated to be sworn into office on Tuesday, did not respond to requests for comment on Saturday.

Clifford Levine, a lawyer for the Brewster campaign, earlier in December told the Trib it was possible the Republican-controlled Senate would not immediately allow the Democrat to be seated in early January and that an ongoing federal lawsuit filed by the Ziccarelli campaign had no merit.

Neither Levine, nor Brewster, could be reached for comment on Saturday.

U.S. District Court Judge Nicholas Ranjan last month rejected an injunction request from the Ziccarelli campaign seeking to halt Allegheny County’s certification of the election results.

Another federal lawsuit seeking to overturn the state’s certification of the race is ongoing.

“The federal judge shut them down,” Levine previously said of the failed bid for an injunction.

Additional legal arguments in the pending federal lawsuit are due by Friday, Jan. 8.