Larry Krasner was first elected Philadelphia district attorney in 2017. Voters of Philadelphia County, which has the same boundaries as the city, expressed unmistakable confidence in their D.A. last year when they reelected the Democrat and self-described progressive prosecutor by a wide margin.
Despite that — in fact, perhaps because of it — Republican members of the Pennsylvania Legislature on Wednesday filed articles of impeachment against him following a report that criticizes his prosecutorial policies but fails to identify any impeachable offense.
This egregious misuse of oversight power is all the more shocking because Pennsylvania lawmakers never bothered to impeach prosecutors who had been accused of actual (and serious) misconduct, including Krasner’s predecessor, R. Seth Williams, who was indicted on 23 corruption counts while in office and ultimately sentenced to five years for bribery. Or Somerset County D.A. Jeffrey Thomas, who was suspended by the state Supreme Court and is awaiting trial on rape charges.
