Judge dismisses Pa. Senate leader @senatorscarnati’s suit against @caucuspa and journalists @BEBumsted and @AngelasInk. https://lancasteronline.com/news/politics/judge-dismisses-pa-senate-leader-s-suit-against-journalists/article_8bcf1c2c-08d0-11eb-a19a-1f9900bfcc60.html

Per @CaucusPA reporter @Wrschgn, Magisterial District Judge Jacqueline Mizerock ruled that Scarnati’s campaign — not the journalists — should be on the hook for the costs his accounting firm incurred providing public records to our team.

The @CaucusPA and @Spotlight investigation found that from 2016 through 2018, the campaigns of Scarnati and other lawmakers spent $3.5 million that could not be fully traced based on the information they disclosed on regular campaign finance reports.

Scarnati’s campaign accounted for almost $246,000 of that, more than any of the nearly 300 campaigns the journalists examined.

The records at issue showed Scarnati used his donors’ money to pay for thousands of dollars in hotel rooms and dinners during a 2016 trip through Europe, among other things.

Hours after @CaucusPA and @SpotlightPA published the original investigation, lawmakers attempted to change the law to make it harder for the public to access the records it relied upon. That effort failed.

Our efforts to obtain records from @senatorscarnati in 2018 were met with some resistance and prompted this @caucuspa cover story.