Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

.

…

Some 21 members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, including Jonathan Fritz, just introduced a resolution for impeachment of Governor Tom Wolf.

I’m standing and doing a long slow clap of hands for Representatives Darryl Metcalfe, Jonathan Fritz and 19 other co-sponsors of a Pennsylvania House Resolution calling for the impeachment of Governor Thomas Westerman Wolf. It’s nice to see elected officials with the courage to do the right thing and this is unequivocally the right thing to do, regardless where it goes. Someone needs to record for history just how badly Tom Wolf has managed the WuFlu response in our Commonwealth.

Here is Rep. Metcalfe’s appeal for support of the resolution (emphasis added):

Gov. Wolf’s orders in response to the COVID-19 outbreak have violated a number of our God-given rights affirmed in the United States Constitution. In particular, his order mandating the closure of physical locations of all businesses that he has deemed ‘non-life sustaining’ has violated our citizens’ rights in many devastating ways.
His order constitutes a taking of property from business owners without just compensation. The lack of due process and judicial review permitted under his order also violates the Constitution. In addition, this order coupled with the stay-at-home order, has violated our rights to free speech and assembly.
Another troubling aspect of his mandates is the utter lack of transparency demonstrated by the administration during this time, as agencies under his control have stopped responding to requests for records and his office has refused to provide vital information. The waiver process established under the Department of Community and Economic Development resulted in arbitrary and capricious decisions about which businesses may stay open.

The public, press and General Assembly all have the right to know about these decisions and how they have been made. While the Wolf administration has finally slowly begun to release some of the relevant information regarding which businesses received waivers, they have yet to release any information about how or why these decisions were made. His delays and obfuscation have been, and continue to be, entirely unacceptable.
His failure to adequately administer our unemployment compensation system has made it so that countless Pennsylvanians who have recently become unemployed due to his orders have been unable to collect the benefits they require to meet their basic needs.
His focus on restraining business is particularly disturbing, as the majority of deaths due to the pandemic have been residents of long-term care facilities. The governor should have focused his attention there, but he has entirely failed to implement a comprehensive state plan to protect our most vulnerable citizens who reside in nursing homes, which have had inadequate supplies of Personal Protective Equipment and testing kits throughout the outbreak.
As Gov. Wolf has violated so many of our fundamental rights as citizens of the Commonwealth, I will be introducing a resolution impeaching the governor and exhibiting Articles of Impeachment to the Senate. His actions plainly constitute the misbehavior in office required for his impeachment under the Pennsylvania Constitution.
While these are certainly challenging times, Gov. Wolf must be held accountable for his actions that have harmed so many of our citizens and violated so many of our rights. No individual or office is above the law.
Please join me in co-sponsoring this important legislation.

Yes! Finally, someone in officialdom says it; Tom Wolf is incompetent and deserves to be impeached! Here is House Resolution 915. Here’s Article IV:

ARTICLE IV

Governor Wolf failed in his duty to protect the citizens of this commonwealth who are most vulnerable to COVVlD-19: residents of nursing homes and long-term care facilities. Although Governor Wolf had ample notice that residents of nursing homes and long-term care facilities were at severe risk of contracting and dying from COVID-I9, Governor Wolf failed to direct the Department of Health to develop and implement a comprehensive plan to protect them. More than two-thirds of all COVID-I9 related fatalities in this commonwealth have occurred in nursing homes and long-term care facilities.

On March 18, 2020, the Department of Health issued guidance urging nursing homes and long-term care facilities to admit and readmit patients who had tested positive for COVID-19. This decision directly endangered alI residents and staff of nursing homes and long-term care facilities. Moreover, the Department of Health moved far too slowly to implement COVlD-19 testing for residents and staff of nursing homes and long-term care facilities in comparison to neighboring states that required such testing.

Wherefore, Governor Thomas W. Wolf is guilty of an impeachable offense warranting removal from office and disqualification to hold any office of trust or profit under this Commonwealth.

There’s also this:

Governor WoIf’s mandated business closure orders have devastated this Commonwealth’s economy. The draconian nature of Governor Wolf’s mandated business closure orders, even as compared to similar orders in other states, ensured that this Commonwealth’s path to economic recovery will be painful and slow. Many of the businesses that Governor Wolf ordered shuttered will never reopen. Governor Wolf’s mandated business closure orders have disproportionally impacted small businesses because larger businesses which sell a variety of products were more easily deemed “life-essential” by Governor Wolf ‘s administration.

Indeed. A huge thank you to these Representatives who have publicly stated the truth many are ignoring. Tom Wolf failed us by following New York’s horrendous lead. He has been a follower, not a leader and it has cost Pennsylvanians immensely, especially the 4,279 elderly in our nursing and personal care homes who died of the WuFlu. Impeachment is for them.