The following letter, signed by over 125 local residents, was sent to Sen. McCormick on June 1, 2026 by registered mail. As of July 23, 2026, McCormick had not responded.
Senator Dave McCormick
702 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Dear Senator Dave McCormick:
We never imagined we would feel compelled to write a letter like this to a sitting United States Senator. Yet here we are—at a moment when silence from those in power is no longer neutrality, but complicity.
We are no longer merely debating policy differences within a healthy democracy. We are witnessing a systemic erosion of that democracy itself. The United States is beginning to resemble the managed, illiberal systems seen in Hungary, Turkey, and India, where elections persist but meaningful checks on power steadily disappear. The transformation is visible in the weakening of institutions, the normalization of executive overreach, and the quiet abandonment of constitutional guardrails.
Mr. Trump’s consolidation of power over the machinery of government is central to this decline. He once decried a “weaponized” Justice Department; now it appears increasingly subordinated to his personal and political interests. Independence has given way to loyalty. Law risks becoming a tool of power rather than a constraint upon it. In such an environment, dissent is no longer simply part of democratic life; it becomes something to fear.
A functioning democracy requires that even the most powerful individuals remain subject to credible, independent legal accountability, a true Sword of Damocles grounded in the rule of law rather than in politics or loyalty. Without that ever-present possibility of consequence, restraint erodes and power expands unchecked. No citizen, and certainly no president, should exist beyond that reach.
Equally concerning is the effort to reshape the electoral landscape itself. Moves to redraw and entrench favorable districts risk insulating those in power from meaningful voter accountability. When electoral systems are engineered to predetermine outcomes, representatives become less responsive to constituents and more beholden to party leadership—or even to a single dominant figure. That is how a constitutional system of representation drifts toward personal rule.
At the same time, we are witnessing the deliberate hollowing out of core public institutions. The dismantling of the Department of Education is being justified through a knowingly false narrative—that federal involvement in education is illegitimate. Federal engagement has long served as a safeguard for equity, access, and national standards. Stripping that away is not principled federalism; it is abdication, leaving millions of children more vulnerable to inequality and neglect.
Our public health infrastructure tells a similarly troubling story. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, once a global leader, has been weakened to the point where its readiness for future crises is in doubt. The faltering response to recent hantavirus cases is not an isolated failure; it is a warning sign. When the next large-scale pandemic arrives, the cost of this erosion will be measured in American lives.
Our treatment of immigrants and asylum seekers is an equally damning measure of our moral drift. We have normalized detention camps, family separations, and summary expulsions as if those fleeing violence and hunger were less than fully human. We have turned our southern border into a theater of cruelty for political gain, using vulnerable families as props rather than as neighbors and fellow bearers of human dignity. When a nation that once prided itself on welcoming the “tired, poor, huddled masses” instead cages its children and vilifies their presence, something essential in its character has already been lost.
Equally disturbing is the role of Congress—particularly under your party’s leadership. Rather than acting as a coequal branch of government, it too often appears content to observe, excuse, or selectively investigate. Oversight, when it occurs, carries the appearance of partisanship rather than principle. Accountability cannot function when it is applied unevenly.
Allow us to identify one of the more egregious manifestations of this broader constitutional decline. Mr. Trump’s proposed $1.8 trillion fund was not authorized by Congress, nor sanctioned by any court. It represents a profound affront to constitutional governance and to the most basic principles of democratic accountability. In our constitutional system, the power of the purse belongs to the people’s elected representatives—not to a single individual acting through grievance, loyalty, or political favoritism.
Pennsylvanians—and all Americans—have every right to ask hard but necessary questions. Who will benefit from this vast concentration of public money? Which corporations, political allies, family associates, or ideological loyalists stand to gain most? How many well-connected insiders, donors, or extremist allies, including some who openly supported political violence in his name, will be rewarded?
This is not merely a policy disagreement. It is the erosion of constitutional norms before our eyes. When vast sums of public money are concentrated without meaningful oversight, transparency, or legislative authorization, the door swings open to patronage, cronyism, and corruption on a breathtaking scale.
The outrage here is not partisan—it is constitutional. No president, Republican or Democrat, should wield such unchecked financial power. The Framers feared precisely this accumulation of authority in the hands of one individual. That is why Congress controls appropriations. That is why courts exist. That is why constitutional limits matter. What we are witnessing is not strength, but contempt for restraint itself.
This is not what the Framers envisioned. Congress was designed to check executive power, not accommodate it. Yet at a moment when that check is most needed, it is conspicuously absent. History is unambiguous about how such moments are judged.
Our standing in the world has eroded just as profoundly. Long‑standing alliances in Europe and Asia have been strained or neglected, while this administration seems to cultivate only two reliable partners: Russia and Israel. Israel’s war in Gaza has already killed well over 70,000 Palestinians, with many thousands more injured or unaccounted for beneath the rubble. Jewish settlers in the West Bank are raiding the homes and farms of Palestinian, confiscating their sheep and cattle, under the approving eyes of Israeli soldiers, while hundreds of minor Palestinian children are imprisoned in Israeli jails. Just this past week, a Palestinian family were forced to exhume their father’s body because it was buried in a cemetery too close to settler homes.
Russia’s brutal war in Ukraine has left vast numbers of civilians dead or injured and has chewed through an almost unimaginable number of soldiers on both sides. To align ourselves so closely with governments that prosecute such wars, while alienating liberal democracies that once looked to us for leadership, is to abandon any credible claim to moral authority abroad.
The expanding war in Iran has only deepened this crisis. Rather than making Americans safer, it has disrupted vital shipping lanes, driven global energy prices sharply higher, and pushed many economies toward a prolonged recession. Pressure on key chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz has triggered a major energy shock, with ordinary families paying the price in higher fuel costs, rising inflation, and mounting economic insecurity. We are trading long-term economic stability and international cooperation for short-term displays of military power that achieve no durable strategic gain.
I have written to you before, particularly about environmental degradation and the refusal to ground policy in established science. Those letters went unanswered in substance. Since writing to you, it is now agreed that the city of New Orleans will be surrounded with ocean water within the next several decades. Your silence is not benign. It signals indifference to problems that will define the lives of our children and grandchildren.
You represent the people of Pennsylvania, not the interests of any one individual or administration. The question before you is not partisan—it is constitutional, institutional, and moral. Will you exercise independent judgment and uphold the responsibilities of your office, or will you continue to stand aside as these erosions accelerate?
Senator McCormick, our names below represent only a small portion of the Pennsylvanians who share these concerns, but we speak with one voice when we say this: the course our country is on is neither sustainable nor worthy of the office you now hold. We are not asking for partisan loyalty or reassuring rhetoric; we are asking you to stand up, in public and in deed, for the constitutional order, human dignity, and rule of law that make self-government possible at all. If you choose instead to remain silent, you are choosing to side with the corrosion of those very foundations and to bear responsibility for what follows, in Pennsylvania and beyond.
We would be honored to have you come to Gettysburg to meet with us and discuss these important issues.
Respectfully,
| Anthony and Marilyn McNevin – Gettysburg William and Patricia Stack – Gettysburg Warren and Evelyn Steen – Gettysburg Jody Jackman – Clarks Summit James M. and Barbara S. Shuta – Dickson City Kathleen Meyers – Gettysburg Roger Lund – Gettysburg William Patterson – Gettysburg Ken and Betty Ann Lepone – Gettysburg Rev. John Bendik – Scranton John and Donna Turwy – Gettysburg Patricia and Richard Shoap – Gettysburg James and Marcella Amspaugh – Gettysburg Stew and Paula Kravits – Gettysburg John Ramirez and Debra Westmoreland – Gettysburg William and Anne Bucher Lane – Gettysburg Rev. John Doris – Scranton Candy and Alan Paulson – Gettysburg Peter and Eleanor B Pella – Gettysburg Eric Wyman – Gettysburg Charles and Jacqueline Weakley – Gettysburg Freddy Blunt – Gettysburg Dana Belgrave Belcher – Gettysburg Sherri Alms – Gettysburg Michael G & Karen G Sheppo – Gettysburg Debra Skobel – Gettysburg Alan Lovitz – Gettysburg Melissa L McCoy – Gettysburg Mark Gouch – Gettysburg Janet Justus and Andrea Wickerham – Gettysburg Susan Myers – Gettysburg Norma Wood, Gettysburg Janet Schollenberger – Gettysburg Nancy McElwee – North Wales Sherry and Bert Waybright – Gettysburg Patrick and Lisa Barno – Gettysburg Brenda Insalaco – Gettysburg Tom & Carolyn DeLoe – Gettysburg Caleb McClure – Gettysburg Joanne Nicholson – Gettysburg Angela Sontheimer – Gettysburg Megan L. Weikel – Gettysburg Ed Riggs – Gettysburg Mary Miner – Gettysburg John & Amanda Day – Gettysburg David Rice – Gettysburg Carol and Mike Williams – Gettysburg Michael Moore, MD – Scranton | Florence March – Gettysburg Bernie Mazer – Gettysburg Louie Chartier – Gettysburg Kevin and Kristin McDonald, Gettysburg Ann Wofford – Gettysburg Dawn Khalil – Gettysburg Willian H and Aritee P. Bond, Gettysburg Scott Flinchbaugh and Chris Oehlmann – Gettysburg Arthur Ostroff – Gettysburg William and Jamey Dubbs Sherri and Barry Hinkle – Gettysburg Amy Duncan – Gettysburg John R. Tschop – Gettysburg Stephen M. Kozlak – Gettysburg Sharon Wofse – Gettysburg Janet Riggs – Gettysburg Duncan and Linda Wilkes – Gettysburg Paul and Alana Di Rienzo – Gettysburg Laurie Gelb – Gettysburg Fred Jensen – Gettysburg Diana DeLorenzo – Gettysburg Ken Jones and Sharon Heimbaugh – Gettysburg Bill and Judy Leslie – Gettysburg Phil and Tara Baugher – Gettysburg Donna Nicholson – Gettysburg Judith Brough – Gardners Donna Kolaetis – Aspers Julia Haller – Aspers Linda Raymond – Gettysburg Barbara Conway – Gettysburg Jane Lordeman – Gettysburg Karen House – Gettysburg John Christopher – Gettysburg Janet M. Powers – Gettysburg John and Deborah Fair – Gettysburg Scott and Shawn Cammarota – Gettysburg Kathleen and Marcus Pratt – Gettysburg Lyne Aurand – Gettysburg John Christopher – Gettysburg John Caccioppoli – Gettysburg Lois Starkey -Orrtanna Nancy Lilley – Gettysburg Linda Noble – Gettysburg Kevin Thomas – Gettysburg Denis Wood – Gettysburg Janice Wolfsheimer – Gettysburg Kathleen Murphy – Gettysburg Carolyn George -Gettysburg Sandra Hartzell – Orrtanna Dr. Donald and Dr. Amie Tannenbaum – Gettysburg Dwight and Sally Michael, Gettysburg |