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Updated 2 hours ago
Some Pennsylvania Republicans are rankled that a candidate for state GOP party chairman helped a Philadelphia Democrat beat federal bribery charges.
“I really don't think it's appropriate for someone who wants to be the Republican leader to go in defense of something like that,” Mary Ann Meloy of Allegheny County, a 2016 Republican National Committee delegate who worked in the Reagan White House, said of Lawrence Tabas testifying this week as an expert witness on behalf of state Sen. Larry Farnese.
A jury on Wednesday acquitted Farnese of bribing a Philadelphia party operative. Prosecutors accused him of donating $6,000 in campaign funds to pay for a study-abroad trip for her daughter in exchange for her support in a ward leadership election.
Farnese disclosed the transaction publicly in an expense report and said he was simply performing a constituent service.
Tabas, the current general counsel for the state Republican Party and candidate for chairmanship, said he testified to protect scores of Republican and Democratic politicians and committees from an “overreach” by federal prosecutors trying to twist state law.
“This would have been the start of the federal government criminalizing what is absolutely legal under Pennsylvania election law,” said Tabas, who chairs the election law division of Philadelphia-based law firm Obermayer Rebmann Maxwell & Hippel. “It doesn't matter who the senator was. What was relevant was this was wrong.”
“I was protecting our people like I've been doing for 14-plus years,” he added.
“Lawrence's legal opinions I've always found to be very well thought out and very intelligent,” said Michael Korns, chairman the Westmoreland County GOP. “If he believes that was the correct legal position, I have no problem with him going in and doing a job really.”
Despite Tabas' intentions, his court appearance has become fodder for his detractors in a campaign against Val DiGiorgio, a former lobbyist and current chairman of the Chester County GOP, for state Republican Party chair.
Republican state committee members will flock to Hershey this weekend to put an end to the contentious intraparty fight. The GOP hasn't had a contested chairmanship election in decades, with squabbles usually fixed behind the scenes.
“Hatfields and McCoys” is how veteran Republican political strategist Christopher Nicholas described it. “They're both very decent, low-key guys, so it's been surprising to hear how vitriolic the battles have become,” he said.
Joe DiSarro, a political science professor at Washington & Jefferson College and a GOP state committeeman, said he's surprised at the “bitterness and factionalism.”
“I don't think I've seen a campaign for state party office that's been this down and dirty,” he said.
Tabas called it “an internal family disagreement, at most.”
“I think it's very healthy for the party to have competing views as to vision and plans for the future,” he said. “We've never really had this kind of debate as to where the party should go and what our strategy should be now and for the future.”
Although Tabas has been an integral cog in the party's apparatus for more than 10 years, he's considered “anti-establishment” in this contest. He has received support from some grassroots supporters of President Donald Trump, like Gabe Keller, a Western Pennsylvania-based Trump activist who said his network of organizers “had a lot to do with (Trump's) win in Pennsylvania.”
“Lawrence Tabas has always been behind Trump,” he said. “He's behind Trump's values.”
DiGiorgio “controlling the state GOP is like California controlling Washington,” Keller said, touching on a rural-versus-urban theme that permeates Pennsylvania politics — despite both Tabas and DiGiorgio hailing from the southeast.
“He doesn't know me. He doesn't know about the good work we do in Chester County,” DiGiorgio responded, touting millions of dollars raised for Republican candidates. “I've been involved for 30 years. They've been involved for 20 minutes. They're spewing hatred, I'm just staying positive.”
Keller said Tabas' testimony in the Farnese case is evidence of his willingness to work across the aisle and chalked up the furor as being trumped up by party power brokers who want to continue their hold on the GOP.
DiGiorgio has locked up support from U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, Republican state legislative leaders and influential Republican national committeeman Bob Asher of Montgomery County.
Rob Gleason, the current chairman who has led the state party since 2006, supports Tabas, DiGiorgio said.
Jenise Harris of Juniata County, a DiGiorgio supporter and state committee member, sent an email to fellow Republicans that said Farnese was acquitted “in large part to Lawrence Tabas' testimony. A Philly Democrat Is Free Because Of Lawrence.”
Tabas disagreed with the characterization, saying his testimony was aimed at preventing prosecutorial overreach into an area of election law that would impact Republicans, too. He said he identified more than 80 committees that have donated to scholarship funds, which is legal under state election law. If federal prosecutors secured a guilty verdict, he contends it would have exposed dozens of committees.
DiGiorgio declined to comment on the issue.
“I told my supporters not to even bother talking about that. The story speaks for itself,” he said. “I'm not going to comment on Lawrence's helping a Democrat.”
Both men believe the party will unify behind whoever wins the campaign to try to capitalize off 2016 victories.
Committee members this weekend could hold possible endorsement votes for upcoming statewide judicial elections, which have largely taken a back seat to the chairmanship campaign.
Kevin Zwick is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at 724-850-2856 or kzwick@tribweb.com.
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