EDITOR'S NOTE: LehighValleyNews.com is partnering with student journalists of The News Lab at Penn State on Election Day reporting. They filed this report.
ALLENTOWN, Pa. — Pennsylvanians went to the polls Tuesday to decide on whether to retain three state Supreme Court justices.
It was a race that brought concerns about abortion rights, food insecurity and fear of federal overreach in an off-year election that could shape the court's direction for the next decade.
In addition to voting for county executive, local mayoral and school board races, voters cast ballots on whether three left-leaning Pennsylvania justices should serve another term of up to 10 years.
The race brought $15 million in spending from partisan groups.
The ballot simply asked for a “yes” or “no” vote on retaining justices Christine Donohue, Kevin Dougherty and David Wecht, which would maintain the 5-2 Democratic majority on the court.
People went to the polls understanding the wide-ranging implications of the retention vote — and with a wide variety of issues on their minds, such as the federal government shutdown, reproductive rights and access to health care.
Jason Kaiser, of Allentown, said his priority was retaining the justices on the ballot. He said he wants the court to settle issues on health care and abortion rights.
He cited his daughter’s right to choose as a motivation.
“I would like our judges to be normal people that actually care about us and will do something to stop [Trump], like [Gov.] Josh Shapiro,” Kaiser, 53, said.
“I think the PA judges that care about us give us a fighting chance.”
Abortion also was top-of-mind for Cathy Zimmerman, 69, who cast her ballot early Tuesday morning as a small stream of voters showed up at Mifflinburg High School in Union County.
Zimmerman said it felt just as important to vote in an off-year as it did to vote in the 2024 presidential election.
“It's important to me that those babies have every right to live,” she said.
In Lehigh Township, Cheryl Mathesz stood outside Hope Lutheran Church handing out Republican literature around 4:45 p.m. when the street lights kicked on.
Three-and-a-half hours earlier, power went out in the neighborhood, knocking out electricity to more than 543 PPL customers, including the church.
Voting operations were not affected. Local officials with the township and county swung by to provide generators, and voting machines can operate on batteries for hours.
The PPL website reported the issue was due to an animal contacting electrical equipment. Despite the issues, Mathesz said she was surprised by the steady stream of voters in the reliably conservative district.
Among her literature were fliers urging "no" votes on judicial retention.
"I am impressed," she said. "People seem interested in supporting the cause."
Fred Preuninger, 72, chose to vote with a mail-in ballot, but stood outside Green Pond United Methodist Church in Bethlehem Township to talk to voters about the stakes of the state Supreme Court election.
“A ‘no’ vote means the judges are not retained and the vacancies mean replacements with big money which means the overturning of our most important laws: women’s rights, abortion, et cetera,” Preuninger said.
In addition to abortion, voters said they have growing concerns about food insecurity, fueled by the ongoing government shutdown that halted Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits in early November.
In the meantime, Pennsylvania has approved partial emergency funding for the two million recipients across the state.
Hunger is the story of Liv Yarrow’s early childhood, she said.
On Tuesday morning, Yarrow walked into College Hill Presbyterian Church in Easton, with her partner S. Daniel Ackerman, 46, eager to cast a vote she hoped would ensure hunger is not the story of another’s childhood.
“It was about preserving and honoring the fact that I was nourished by food stamps,” Yarrow, 49, said. “Without food stamps, I would not have had the nutrition I needed to go to school, study and do what I needed to do in my life.”
Kaiser said he also has faced financial hardship, struggling to make ends meet despite having “more than a four-year degree,” which he said was “absurd.”
He said he almost qualified for SNAP at one point.
"[Trump's] got billions and billions of dollars for everything except taking care of the people,” Kaiser said.
But fear, most of all, is what Kaiser said brought him to the polls — the fear of speaking out and the fear of retaliation stoked the most worry.
“I’m almost ashamed to say, but I am afraid," he said. "When I looked through social media just last night, I saw ICE agents beating up a guy that looked just like me.
“Our administration is coming after people that just disagree with our president. I’m afraid they’re going to come after me. That’s extraordinarily F-ed up.”
A multitude of local races also brought folks to the polls. In East Allen Township, Cory Fenstermaker stepped outside the East Allen Fire Company around 5:30 p.m. after casting his ballot.
The former Northampton Area School Board director said the township and school board races were his top priorities. While national politics dominate the news, the local campaigns determine important quality-of -life issues.
"When you get down to brass tacks, this is the election that really matters," he said.
The school district is wrapping up construction on a new elementary school that has divided the community; he opposed it while on the board.
While it's too late to reverse course, voters need to get the right leaders to turn the district around, he said.
Meanwhile, the township is being overwhelmed by tractor-trailers with new warehouse development in the area. Supervisors will need to adapt if they hope to keep the big rigs where they belong, he said.
"You have roads and laws that say, 'OK, you can't go there,' but what are you going to do to enforce it?'" he said. "They need to think about a police force to enforce the laws."
Contributing to this article were student journalists from The News Lab at Penn State: Mia Debelevich, Kakii Kibua, Alexandria Smith, Kahlie Wray and Milan Varia.
LehighValleyNews.com reporter Tom Shortell also contributed to this report.