Could Kathleen Kane Spoil Hillary Clinton’s Election Chances?

Bloomberg Politics has an article today speculating that Kathleen Kane’s continuing scandal — scandals? It seems multiple, but we’re not sure how they can be separated from each other — might undermine Hillary Clinton’s chances of being elected president in 2016.

The premise seems dubious — it’s been decades since Pennsylvania voted Republican for president, leaving our status as “swing state” mostly mythical. Still everybody plays along. 

“If it’s Hillary against another Republican who might take away some of the more conservative Democratic voters, then anything is possible,” says Thomas Baldino, a professor of political science at Wilkes University in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.

“I can’t imagine that any Democrat running in 2016 is happy that Kathleen Kane is still around,” said Republican strategist Charlie Gerow, who is helpng run Carly Fiorina’s campaign. “It puts them in a position of having to consistently call on her to resign, and that’s not where you want to be when you’re running for office on the same party ticket.”

All this can seem tempting enough when Kane’s office seems to provide fresh new bad headlines every day. (Today? We’re told her office just handed over one million emails to a special prosecutor. Sigh.) But, God willing, by next November all this will be over. She’s going to be arraigned for trial in January on charges she leaked secret grand jury information; the first few months of 2016 might even bring Kane’s removal from office, either by Gov. Wolf and the Senate working together, or through the more traditional impeachment process.

A year from now, in other words, the Kathleen Kane scandals might well be a dim memory for most voters. It’s doubtful that will hurt Hillary Clinton — or any other Democrat who happens to capture the nomination.