The Pa. Supreme Court sided with DA Larry Krasner in his impeachment suit, casting doubt on the effort to remove him

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court handed Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner another victory — and perhaps a decisive one — 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.

Krasner did not comment on the decision. But his office, in a statement, called the decision “a victory for democracy and for the citizens of Philadelphia.” And one of his lawyers, John Summers, said the ruling “means that the impeachment effort is dead,” saying it ended an “unconstitutional” effort to remove a locally elected official over policy disagreements.

“Legislators, predominantly from outside of Philadelphia, effectively tried to nullify [Krasner’s] election by trying to impeach him, and the courts said, appropriately, that there are guardrails on this process,” Summer said.

Jason Gottesman, a spokesperson for House Republicans — who initiated the original impeachment process two years ago — declined to say if the caucus might try to pursue the matter again. He said the measure that passed in 2022 was “a momentous step in holding [Krasner] accountable” and “will remain a stain on his record.”

State Rep. Martina White, a Northeast Philadelphia Republican who was among the most enthusiastic backers of the impeachment drive, said Krasner had simply benefited from a legal technicality.

“He cannot claim his innocence, as [a] trial has not yet happened,” White said in a statement.

The House GOP launched impeachment proceedings in 2022 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 that November, 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, 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.”

» READ MORE: Pa. Commonwealth Court releases opinion calling impeachment articles against DA Larry Krasner legally insufficient

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 district attorney 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, including 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.

(Two justices did not participate in the decision: Justice Kevin Dougherty, a Philadelphia Democrat, who withdrew because he had written an earlier court opinion criticizing Krasner, and Justice P. Kevin Brobson, a Dauphin County Republican, who recused himself because a lawyer representing Krasner’s opponents had previously worked as the justice’s personal attorney.)

Indeed, the issue of legislative timing was of particular interest to Krasner. When his impeachment was approved, House Republicans were on the verge of losing their controlling majority for the first time in decades. The district attorney and his allies believed it would be far less likely for Democrats to reintroduce or approve impeachment legislation while in control of the chamber.

Summers, one of Krasner’s lawyers, said he believed Thursday’s decision would have lasting significance because it made clear that those types of political calculations should not be a central consideration when legislators are weighing something as serious as impeachment.

“Someday, the majority may be different, and the politics may be different, and these [court] decisions stand for the neutral proposition that political majorities can’t just try and remove elected officials or other officials because they have the power,” he said. “And that will be a long salutatory shadow of these decisions.”