Liv Bennett has withdrawn from the Democratic primaries for both Allegheny County executive and the County Council seat to which she is seeking re-election.
Her departure trims the field of Democratic executive hopefuls to six: former Pittsburgh school board member Theresa Sciulli Colaizzi; Dave Fawcett, an attorney and former county councilor; state Rep. Sara Innamorato; Pittsburgh city Controller Michael Lamb; entrepreneur Will Parker; and county Treasurer John Weinstein.
The stakes are high when voters cast their ballots May 16, given that the executive can play a major role in setting the county government’s agenda on issues such as air quality, property taxes and the county jail; proposes the county’s $1 billion budget; and fills seats on boards and commissions. The current county executive is Rich Fitzgerald, a term-limited Democrat who will complete his third and final term at the end of this year.
Bennett wrote in a post on her campaign website that she was disappointed by the lack of support for her run.
“We can’t continue to talk about the need to put Black women and other BIPOC people into seats of power but when the opportunity comes, we don’t support them,” she wrote.
But she is not done with politics, and will run for re-election to County Council in November’s general election as an independent. She was first elected in 2019 to represent the 13th District, which stretches from Bellevue to Pittsburgh’s southern hilltop neighborhoods, and east to the Strip District and Lawrenceville.
Bennett will face David Bonaroti, a Google employee who lives in Lawrenceville and won the Allegheny County Democratic Committee’s endorsement earlier this month. Bonaroti had filed a challenge against Bennett’s paperwork to run for re-election and alleged, among other things, that some of her documents were not received timely by the county elections office.
“We have done some amazing work on County Council. From getting the police review board passed to paid sick leave,” Bennett wrote on her campaign website. “I want to continue this work and advocacy. The 13th district is rich in diversity and culture.”
Bennett’s ability to run as independent relies on precedent established in the Packrall v. Quail case, which the state Supreme Court decided in 1963. It allows for an exception to Pennsylvania’s “sore loser” rule, which prevents candidates who lose in a primary or are removed from the ballot by a judge from running in a general election held the same year.
But three justices — Debra Todd, David Wecht and Christine Donohue — wrote recently that the exception should be overruled, meaning Bennett is potentially mounting her re-election bid on shaky legal ground.
Jon, a copy editor and reporter at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, is currently on strike and working as a co-editor of the Pittsburgh Union Progress. Reach him at jmoss@unionprogress.com.
