H EADLINES
Jewish Judge Runs for Pa. Supreme Court
L OCA L
JESSE BERNSTEIN | JE STAFF
THE TRAVEL. Th at’s what
Pennsylvania Superior Court
Judge Maria McLaughlin
remembers from her last bid
for statewide offi ce, almost
more than anything else: the
interminable drives.

In her last campaign,
McLaughlin left straight from
work on a Friday and didn’t
return home to Philadelphia
until Sunday night, driving
for hours to every corner of
the state. Lackawanna County,
Luzerne County, wherever, if
you had an audience for her
to speak to, she’d give them
an hour.

Now, a s Mc L au g h l i n
prepares for another statewide
campaign, this time for a seat
on the Pennsylvania Supreme
Court, she admits that there’s
at least a little bit of a silver
lining to the travel and crowd
restrictions of the pandemic.

Such is the power of Zoom.

“I can be in western
Pennsylvania and eastern
Pennsylvania in the same
night,” she said.

McLaughlin, 54, regrets
that she won’t get to meet as
many voters in person as in
her previous campaigns, and
sees the relationships she made
during her visits as integral
to her upcoming eff ort. But it
does make it a little easier for
her to do her day job while she
runs for offi ce.

Democrat McLaughlin
announced in December that
she would seek the open seat
on the Pennsylvania Supreme
Court. Th e court is already
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weighted 5-2 with Democratic
justices, and with Chief Justice
Th omas Saylor, a Republican,
set to retire at the end of the
year, McLaughlin’s eleva-
tion would further enshrine a
Democratic majority.

Ultimately, what spurred
McLaughlin to run was a
combination of good timing
and a little gumption.

“When I was in college, I
said, ‘Why not law school?’
When I was in law school, ‘Why
not prosecutor?’ When I was a
prosecutor, ‘Why not be the
trial judge?’ When I was a trial
judge, ‘Why not be the superior
court judge?’ And now it’s no
diff erent,” McLaughlin said. “I
never envisioned — I never
dreamed, as a little girl — that
I would be a Supreme Court
justice.” McLaughlin grew up in
Overbrook and attended West
Catholic High School. Aft er
graduating from Delaware Law
School-Widener University,
she spent nearly 20 years as an
assistant district attorney in
Philadelphia, rising to chief of
the Child Support Enforcement
Unit. She ran for offi ce for the
fi rst time in 2011, winning a
seat on the Philadelphia Court
of Common Pleas, and served
there until 2017. Th at year,
McLaughlin was the leading
vote-getter among all nine
candidates for the Superior
Court. As McLaughlin prepares for
her upcoming campaign, she
said that her motivations for
seeking higher offi ce are the
same as they were back in 2011,
but to a greater degree: a sense
of responsibility.

“It’s their offi ce,” McLaughlin
said of the public. “It’s every-
one’s offi ce, it’s not mine.

Th e black robe is mine. But
it belongs to everyone in
Pennsylvania, not just the ones
who voted for me, not just
the ones who got me elected.

Everyone.” In early conversations
JEWISH EXPONENT
Judge Maria McLaughlin is running for the Supreme Court of
Pennsylvania Photo by R.D. Gallego
with voters, McLaughlin has
found that they’re asking the
same questions of her that
she’s always been asked, with
the added aspect of COVID.

During the pandemic, she
assumed the role of liaison
between the Pennsylvania Bar
Association and the Superior
Court, which has made her a
go-to for those with questions
about the practice of law in
lockdown. McLaughlin, who is married
to former
Philadelphia controller Jonathan Saidel and
converted to Judaism in 2017,
said that she draws on her
Jewish identity in her work.

In 2017, she told the Jewish
Exponent that this was the case
because Judaism “is based on
laws. It’s the laws that govern
our society, the laws that are
the foundation of our national
conscience. So that in and of
itself makes Judaism have an
impact on what I do on a daily
basis.” As her engagement with
Judaism has deepened, she’s
proud to sit down to Shabbat
dinner each week and to feel
love for Israel. At a time when
Judaism has oft en been “a
target,” McLaughlin said, she’s
never hidden the fact of her
faith, and has no plans to do so.

With the May 18 primary
approaching, McLaughlin is
amazed at the opportunity
before her.

“Th e diff erence that I can
make, the fact that I even had
the opportunity to run in this
kind of an election, let alone
be a justice on our Supreme
Court, it’s just amazing,” she
said. “It’s not an opportunity
that I ever thought I would
have.” ●
jbernstein@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
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