Meet Eugene DePasquale, the Democrat running to be Pennsylvania’s next attorney general
As the state’s top prosecutor, DePasquale said, he would protect democracy, abortion rights and LGBTQ+ people.
It’s not easy for Eugene DePasquale, the Democrat running for Pennsylvania attorney general, to pinpoint exactly when he knew he wanted to dedicate his life to public service, but he knows the decision was largely shaped by his father’s battle with addiction.
After being wounded by gunfire while fighting in Vietnam, DePasquale’s father spent decades fighting an addiction to painkillers. DePasquale said that battle led to his father being sentenced to 10-and-a-half years in prison for dealing drugs when DePasquale was in his early 20s. When his 20-year-old brother died of muscular dystrophy while DePasquale was in law school, his father had to attend the funeral in shackles.
Now DePasquale hopes to win his bid for attorney general in November’s election and support Pennsylvanians fighting addiction.
“I’ve seen both sides of the criminal justice system,” DePasquale told the Pennsylvania Independent while on a brief break from campaigning in Gettysburg on July 23. “I’ve seen both sides of what I view as the most failed war in the history of the United States, and that’s the war on drugs that we have to turn into a battle against addiction.”
DePasquale, a Pittsburgh native who served in the state House and as the state auditor general and now teaches law at the University of Pittsburgh, is running against Republican Dave Sunday to become Pennsylvania’s top prosecutor. Michelle Henry, the current attorney general, is not running for reelection after being appointed to finish the term of Democrat Josh Shapiro after he left the office to become governor.
As attorney general, Shapiro negotiated billions of dollars in settlements with opioid manufacturers. As that money continues to come to the state, DePasquale says he wants to help make sure the settlement funds will go to the treatment and prevention programs that are saving Pennsylvanians’ lives.
“We now have this historic opioid settlement that we have the ability to distribute funds in a way that helps put a dent in the opioid epidemic in Pennsylvania,” DePasquale said.
Fighting right-wing attacks on democracy
DePasquale said one of his top priorities as attorney general would be to protect democracy. Should there be a replay in 2024 of attempts by former President Donald Trump and his Republican allies to overturn Pennsylvania’s election results through a maelstrom of legal challenges, as occurred after the 2020 election, DePasquale said, his role would be to fight any efforts to undermine democracy.
“It’s making sure that we have a system where the voters pick our leaders, not the lawyers,” DePasquale said.
Pennsylvania Republicans have repeatedly attempted to disqualify residents’ ballots in a swing state that plays a critical role in electing the nation’s president. Trump and Republican leaders in the Legislature filed lawsuits ahead of the 2020 election challenging the counting of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania after Election Day. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal of a state Supreme Court decision in those lawsuits allowing mail-in ballots to be received and counted up to three days after Election Day.
Earlier this year, 27 right-wing state lawmakers attempted to restrict voting access in Pennsylvania by filing a lawsuit that went after Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro over a recently implemented automatic voter registration program and President Joe Biden’s 2021 executive order directing federal agencies to expand voting access. A federal judge dismissed the suit in March.
As the November election nears, Trump, Republican politicians and right-wing pundits have amplified lies about election integrity in Pennsylvania, an onslaught of disinformation that experts say could lead to violence.
Biden defeated Trump in Pennsylvania in 2020 by 80,555 votes.
Abortion access
Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022, it was once again up to individual states to implement their own laws regulating abortion. In Pennsylvania, abortion is legal through the 23rd week of pregnancy. DePasquale said he would defend the right to abortion.
“I will defend that reproductive freedom, whether it means it’s for the women of Pennsylvania or for anyone leaving one of these authoritarian right-wing states that are coming here,” he said.
“[Pennsylvania] law gives me the ability to quash a subpoena that some of these other state attorneys general are going to issue, protect the private health data of women, and to make sure that they have their freedoms protected in Pennsylvania.”
Residents of states that have banned or severely restricted abortion are increasingly turning to Pennsylvania for health care. The number of people coming from out of state to Pennsylvania for abortions in 2022 rose by nearly 41% over the previous year, according to an analysis of Pennsylvania Department of Health data by the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Protecting LGBTQ+ Pennsylvanians
If DePasquale wins in November, he said, he would vigilantly prosecute hate crimes against LGBTQ+ individuals. He said he would work closely with schools to prevent and address the bullying of LGBTQ+ children.
“When it comes to bullying in our schools, I want to make it clear to our administrators, our principals, that it’s not going to be tolerated,” he said. “We don’t tolerate bullying in our public schools, period, end of story, and I will be putting directives out to our school districts to make sure that they know that I’m going to be watching that very closely.
“Our kids, whoever they are, have the right to learn without being bullied,” DePasquale said.
