Unlike most states, Pennsylvania’s judges and appellate court justices run for their offices in partisan elections. Wecht ran for “retention,” or reelection, as a Democrat just last year, winning another 10-year term.
However, Wecht has also spoken out against what he has seen as an increase in antisemitism for years. Soon after the Tree of Life attack, he criticized Rep. Ilan Omar, D-Minn., for comments he said were antisemitic and called for her to be “disciplined.”
Last week, Wecht joined U.S. District Judge Roy Altman of the Southern District of Florida in Pittsburgh to discuss Altman’s recently published book “Israel on Trial: Examining the History, the Evidence, and the Law.” Altman has accused college activists protesting Israel’s reaction to Hamas’ October 2023 attack of being “brainwashed.”
“I was shocked that these people were blaming the victims, that suddenly the Jews were the oppressors, that the Jewish women who were raped and their daughters who were raped were the aggressors,” Altman said.
More than 1,200 Israelis, most of them civilians, were killed in the attack. Israel has since engaged in a war to annihilate Hamas, which is now going on two and a half years and is estimated to have killed tens of thousands of Gazans.
In his statement, Wecht said that he would maintain “impartial justice” on the court, including if it requires him to “vindicate the legal rights that haters and extremists of all stripes enjoy in our country and in our Commonwealth.”
“I am confined to a judicial role, and in that role, I maintain independence at all times and in all respects,” he wrote. “My voting registration now reflects my independence as well.”
WHYY News has reached out to the Pennsylvania Democratic Party but has not received a response by publication.
