The Pennsylvania Supreme Court sided with DA Larry Krasner in his impeachment suit, casting doubt on the effort to remove him
PHILADELPHIA — The Pennsylvania Supreme Court handed Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner another victory in his effort to block a long-stalled impeachment drive, ruling that state lawmakers who tried to remove him from office two years ago had improperly attempted to stretch that process across two different legislative sessions.
The decision, issued Thursday, could spell an end to a 2022 effort to oust the city's reform-oriented prosecutor, and it raised significant new questions about how or whether lawmakers might move forward with any similar attempts in the future.
House Republicans initiated the impeachment proceedings by accusing Krasner, a Democrat, of enacting policies that fueled the city's shooting crisis, mishandling criminal cases, and violating the rights of crime victims. They introduced an impeachment resolution in November 2022, which passed almost exclusively along party lines.
Krasner denied the allegations and cast the process as illegal and politically motivated. He sued to overturn the resolution, placing the issue on hold before a trial could begin in the state Senate.
Last year, the Commonwealth Court sided with Krasner on the heart of his challenge, ruling that none of the articles of impeachment met the required legal standard of “misbehavior in office.”
But the court rejected two other arguments raised by Krasner in the same suit, ruling that impeachment proceedings could occur across different legislative sessions — which the DA said was unlawful — and saying state lawmakers could impeach a locally elected district attorney.
The high court's new ruling left intact Krasner's initial legal victory. But it also sided with Krasner on one of the other issues, saying the articles of impeachment “became null and void” at the end of 2022, when a two-year legislative session came to a close.
Most legislation must be proposed, voted on, and signed into law within the same two-year term because the makeup and leadership of the House or Senate can change from term to term based on election results.
And Chief Justice Debra Todd said there are other practical reasons this principle must apply to impeachment, pointing out that some senators who would have been asked to vote on Krasner's fate in 2023 may not have been elected to office yet in 2022, when the articles were approved by the House and then accepted by the upper chamber.
“The Constitution simply does not textually permit the House and the Senate of a subsequent session of the General Assembly to take any further action on matters which the House or Senate of a prior session of the General Assembly may have begun, but not finished during that session,” Todd wrote in her opinion.
Indeed, that issue is partly why Krasner appeared eager to have the courts rule in his favor on the matter. When his impeachment was approved, House Republicans were on the verge of losing their controlling majority for the first time in decades. The DA and his allies believed it would be far less likely for Democrats to re-introduce or approve impeachment legislation while in control of the chamber.
Krasner's office did not issue an immediate comment Thursday on the high court's ruling, nor did a spokesperson for House Democrats.
Jason Gottesman, a spokesperson for House Republicans, said the original impeachment that passed in 2022 was “a momentous step in holding [Krasner] accountable” and “will remain a stain on his record.”
Gottesman declined to say if the caucus would try to take the impeachment issue up again.
