Pennsylvania House Speaker Joanna McClinton reacts after her reelection to the post on swearing-in day Jan. 7, 2025 (Capital-Star/Peter Hall)
The Pennsylvania House of Representatives began its new legislative session Tuesday like the previous session, with conditions ripe for partisan gridlock.
Instead, a dose of pragmatism and rule changes to give the minority Republican Caucus a fighting chance to advance its legislative agenda helped the chamber with an easy and orderly start to the 2025-2026 session.
Pennsylvania Supreme Court Chief Justice Debra Todd led the swearing in of 202 state representatives, including 16 first-term lawmakers, evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats as the session began with one Democratic incumbent absent.
Speaker Joanna McClinton (D-Philadelphia) returned to the post after Republican Leader Jesse Topper (R-Bedford) withdrew his nomination to lead the House following a deadlocked vote between the two.
Topper told reporters Tuesday that bowing out of a battle for the House speaker’s gavel would spare the House and its constituents a repeat of 2023, when the lack of a clear majority and the election of a compromise speaker resulted in months of inaction.
“This was the way that we felt we could not only move the House forward, but also adopt rules that empowered the minority and again, allowed for a more deliberative body,” Topper said. “And we think that that was the right way to go to get to work for the people of Pennsylvania.”
On the other side of the Capitol, Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward (R-Westmoreland) struck a more partisan tone in her opening remarks but acknowledged the need to work with Democrats in the divided legislature.
House Democrats retained a one-seat majority in the November election. But state Rep. Matthew Gergley (D-Allegheny) suffered a serious medical emergency on New Year’s Eve that will keep him away from the Capitol for the foreseeable future, House Democratic Leader Matt Bradford told reporters Tuesday.
That leaves the House evenly divided with a 101-101 split between Democrats and Republicans.
In January 2023, a similar situation gave Republicans a temporary majority and the chamber was unable to elect a speaker. A group of Republicans brokered a deal to support Berks County Rep. Mark Rozzi with his, ultimately unfulfilled, promise to become an independent. Rozzi held the role for two months until a special election restored the Democrats’ 102-seat majority and McClinton was elected as the first woman and the first Black woman Speaker of the House.
In remarks on the House floor Tuesday afternoon, McClinton reflected on the success of the narrowly divided House in passing legislation to provide more and larger property tax breaks and rent rebates for seniors, improve women’s health by requiring insurance to pay for breast cancer screening and establishing a framework for education funding parity across the state.
“We cannot predict the difficulties to come, but one thing we know is that if we come in here with a willing mind and sleeves rolled up to work together and collaborate, nothing is impossible,” McClinton said.
Kim Ward reelected Pennsylvania Senate president, and broadly outlines Republican agenda
Bradford said in remarks on the House floor that even with a 102-vote majority, he counseled members of his caucus to be humble in their approaches to the other party. With Gergley’s absence, he repeated his advice.
“We need to be humble and we need to be wise,” Bradford said. “And I want to thank and congratulate the new Republican leader who’s opened a door for that type of cooperation. You’re a good man, Mr. Topper, and I thank you.”
New rules
The House approved a set of operating rules with a 196-6 vote. The rules’ major changes include the deletion of the definition of majority party and increase the number of minority members on the House’s standing committees.
Under the previous session’s rules, the “majority party” was defined as the party that won the largest number of elections for the 203 House seats for that session. That resulted in the Democratic Caucus retaining control of the chamber on several occasions despite having the same number or fewer seats than the Republicans.
“All of our rules are incumbent on who has the majority at the time, right?” Topper said in a media gaggle. “I think all of these rule changes simply reflect the divided nature of the chamber. It will allow us to be more deliberative in how we operate. All of the rule changes were focused on that.”
Bradford said it was clear that concessions would be required given Gergley’s absence, and while everyone in the House is hoping for his speedy recovery, they recognized they have a duty to do the people’s business.
“That’s what we did today,” Bradford said. “And I think, frankly, it’s a feel-good story that both parties recognize that reality and govern accordingly.”
He added that the situation differs fundamentally from 2023, when a Democratic incumbent was reelected even though he had died weeks before the election and two other Democrats resigned to take higher offices. Republicans blocked McClinton’s election and nominated Rozzi with the goal of stripping Democrats of their majority.
“I think everyone realized that those political games didn’t really work out well for those that went down that road,” Bradford said “That was not, in retrospect, a good idea. So I think we are all wiser and in a better place for the experience.”
In addition to allowing the majority to be the majority, the rules give the minority party an additional member on each standing committee bringing the partisan makeup to 14-12. Topper said that would require the majority to get one more vote to move legislation out of a committee.
The new rules also rework the process by which lawmakers may use a discharge resolution to force a bill out of a committee to the floor for a vote. Under the old rules, a petition required 25 signatures from each party to succeed, rendering such petitions practically useless. The new rules simply require 25 signatures for a discharge petition.
The number of standing committees will increase from 24 to 27 with the addition of committees on communications and technology, energy, and intergovernmental affairs and operations. Topper said the expansion would reduce the number of bills that some committees currently handle.
And the way that amendments to bills on the floor are handled will change to ensure that more amendments are considered.
Overall, Topper said he hopes the changes and a pragmatic approach to control in the House will lead to a more productive session.
“There’s too many big issues facing Pennsylvania to not be able to come into session just because the numbers don’t look like what one side or the other wants them to look like,” he said “This is not a hobby. We need to get in and do the work. And we believe that the new rules reflect that.”
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