In recent weeks, you may have received a political mailer suggesting you vote no on justices up for Pa. Supreme Court retention in order to “term limit” them or to “defend democracy.” Democratic and progressive groups describe the language of these mailers as deceptive — with dire stakes for Pennsylvanians.
“A lot of big-money donors now are putting in ads that have progressive messaging, but it’s for a Republican cause,” Miracle Jones, director of legislative affairs for 1Hood Power, tells Pittsburgh City Paper. “It makes it very hard and difficult talking to people at their doors and on the phones.”
The retention election, part of Election Day on Nov. 4, asks voters to choose between keeping the three Democratic justices making the court majority Democrat, or rejecting them.
In Pennsylvania, after Supreme Court justices get elected, they face a flat “yes” or “no” retention ballot question every 10 years until they age out or otherwise leave their post. If they’re not retained, Democratic Pa. Gov. Josh Shapiro can appoint a temporary replacement only if it’s approved by two-thirds of the Republican-controlled state Senate, which remains at odds with Shapiro.
This could lead to chaos in the short term and Republican control of the Supreme Court in the long term. A dysfunctional, deadlocked 2-2 Supreme Court could mean disparate rulings from various judges across the state would have less of a chance of being adjudicated.
“There are going to be situations where, one day, a judge will say this; the next day, a judge will say that; and we won’t have an ability or a mechanism to settle the law in Pennsylvania, and we’re just going to be in limbo for two years,” Jones says.
State supreme courts make decisions on a variety of issues. Because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade, which guaranteed abortion rights across the country, and because of U.S. President Donald Trump and his allies’ penchant for casting doubt on election results, the Pa. Supreme Court retention election has garnered both local and national attention. Gerrymandering, the subject of a Pa. Supreme Court decision in 2018 and a hot topic in national news this year, also comes to mind for advocates.
Among those paying attention is the right-wing group Commonwealth Partners, funded in part by billionaire Jeffrey Yass, which paid for those mailers about “term limits” and “defending democracy.” This funding, as detailed by Spotlight PA, comes alongside funding from the ACLU and the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, which have also each contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to the election.
“There’s not a real playbook for this,” Allegheny County Democratic Committee (ACDC) chair Sam Hens-Greco tells City Paper. “In the past, retention elections were really very sleepy affairs, rarely where people would lose retention elections. The strategies of the past were ‘be quiet, keep your head down, keep out of the news, you’ll get retained.’ Clearly, this is a different one.”
For its part, ACDC has been attempting to get more people paying attention to the race and providing education about it. For example, in addition to traditional means such as texts and mailers, the committee has been contacting voters who signed up to vote by mail last year but haven’t yet this year.
“It’s low voter turnout, and it’s low information,” Hens-Greco says. “Those are the main two things we’ve been attacking.”
This comes in addition to efforts from other local groups, including 1Hood Power, which has been handing out information at events and preparing digital ads for social media.
“Our ads are edgier, obviously for a different audience. We’re a more progressive-leaning organization,” Jones says. “So again, it’s not a rubber-stamp approval. We do have disagreements with the Democratic Party and disagreements with moderates.”
It’s up in the air how the election will go. Both sides have money behind them, and off-year elections tend to attract very few voters. For what it’s worth, earlier this year, Elon Musk amply funded and campaigned for a Republican candidate for Wisconsin’s supreme court and lost big. That race more closely resembled a partisan battle between two candidates rather than a retention question, and voters had specific reactions to Musk’s role in the early days of the Trump administration, both key differences. Still, the Wisconsin race may speak to American voters’ concerns about the actions of the federal government.
“It’s just different. It’s apples versus oranges,” Hens-Greco says. “But I do think there is, at least we’ll be tapping into it, a real sense of disgust with what’s coming out of Washington.”
Truth be told, there’s no way to really know which way the wind blows regarding a low-turnout statewide election. However, it’s clear that this time around, the stakes are higher, and big players are spending more money and drawing more eyes to get their preferred outcome.
“It’s not your grandfather’s retention election,” Hens-Greco says.
This article appears in Election Guide Oct. 8-14, 2025.
