Comans will pose a primary challenge to Rep. Pa. Salisbury

A school principal and community activist is entering the race for the state House District 34 seat, posing a primary challenge to the seat of state Rep. Abigail Salisbury (D-34th District).

Ashley Comans, a Principal of the school in Wilkinsburg and longtime resident of western Pennsylvania, announced on Tuesday that he is seeking the Democratic Party’s nomination for the Allegheny County district. She told the Capital-Star she wants to make sure Democrats apply their slim majority in the Legislature to focus on communities that often feel excluded.

“So when we think about the voices that resonate in Harrisburg and represent the people of their district, they should also be people who have an understanding and experience of the community,” Comans said. She is the wife of the mayor of Wilkinsburg Dontae Comans.

She pointed at Decision of the Commonwealth Court which deemed Pennsylvania’s current public education funding model unconstitutional and identified “care infrastructure,” which it said includes paid family leave and affordable child care, as the most crucial issues for the district.

Salisbury says he knows Comans and adds that he thinks she is a “nice person.” Salisbury added that she isn’t really thinking about running for office competitively like some people do.

“My philosophy on running for office is that I don’t really see it as running against other people,” Salisbury said in an interview with the Capital-Star. “You just have a platform of what you want to do and you put it out there. If people like it, they will vote for you. If they like the other person’s platform, they vote for it.

In 2021, Comans announced that she would run for the 24th House District seat, a seat that was vacant following the election of Ed Gainey as mayor of Pittsburgh. However, after redistricting, the boundaries of the State House changed, Comans withdrew its offer for a place because up-to-date maps placed it in the 34th house district, and focused on helping Summer Lee run for Congress.

Salisbury made his first attempt at public office in 2022, when he was a member of Swissvale Borough Council. She fired basic challenge then-State Rep. Summer Lee of the 34th House District. Lee won that race by 30 points, but was elected to Congress that same year.

Comans and Salisbury was among four candidates who ran for the Democratic Party nomination in a special election to replace Lee in the 34th District, but tHe Allegheny County Democratic Committee chose Salisbury as his candidate. She won a special election in February, going to A 75-point win over Republican Robert Pagane.

Comans is widely considered Lee’s ally.

Salisbury official website He lists infrastructure updates, human rights, compact business development, supporting public schools and environmental protection as his priorities. She is recent was a leading voice in this action to move Pennsylvania’s presidential primary election from April 23, 2024, because it currently conflicts with the Jewish holiday of Passover. Salisbury, the only Jewish woman in the State House, and other supporters of moving the primary election believe the current date could disenfranchise Jewish voters.

While Salisbury said supporters of moving the date were in Harrisburg this week in a sustained effort to move the primary date away from Passover, the Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman said in a statement on October 18 that talk of moving the original deadline to 2024 “is over in the state Senate.”

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