The current representative in the 122nd House District is Republican Doyle Heffley. This spring the Democrats in Carbon County (the county covered by the district) did not produce a candidate who had the requisite 300 petition signatures. Six years ago Heffley sent a mailer to Democrats asking them to write his name in. Over 300 did, resulting in Heffley running in both parties, just like elections in the old Soviet Union.
This year anger at Heffley’s support for data center construction boiled over in Penn Forest Township and other areas of the county. One data center has already been approved, and three more are planned. Residents of Penn Forest approached one of their Supervisors, Christian Bartulovich, and asked him to run a write-in campaign on the Democratic side. (Bartulovich is a registered Republican.)
In one of the most amazing campaigns I have witnessed, a group of fairly novice volunteers put a campaign together in about 20 days, including mailers, signs, social media ads, and volunteers to stand at the polls. Heffley got wind of the effort, of course, and sent out THREE separate mailers to Dems asking them to write in his name. He is one of those Republicans who call the Democratic Party the “Democrat Party,” and he did that in his mailers–not a particularly smart move.
In any case Mr. Bartulovich had more write-ins on the Democratic side than Heffley. He will be the Democratic candidate in November. Bartlovich also received hundreds of write-ins on the Republican side, indicating that Heffley has irritated quite a few Republicans as well.
I have met Mr. Bartulovich. He is intelligent and listens to constituents. That’s so different from our current situation.
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