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Stephanie Singer to keep fighting but not for her seat

During a Monday morning rally at the 1199 National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees’ Locust Street headquarters, City Commissioner Stephanie Singer said the May 19 primary election is no longer possible for her.

City Commissioner Stephanie Singer has officially surrendered to the re-election forces.

During a Monday morning rally at the 1199 National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees' Locust Street headquarters, Singer said the May 19 primary election is no longer possible for her.

"This is an election I can no longer win," Singer said.

Singer's name will not appear on the May 19 primary election ballot, Commonwealth Court ruled Thursday. The court rejected Singer's appeal of a Common Pleas Court ruling March 30 striking her name from the ballot.

Singer has 10 days to appeal to the state Supreme Court. But even if she does appeal, it would be too late to run a campaign, she said.

"I'm going to keep fighting for what's right… It's not for me because it's really too late," Singer told a rally of about 50 people. "The people who brought the lawsuit, they got what they wanted."

Singer needed at least 1,000 signatures from registered Democrats on nomination petitions to be listed on the ballot. She filed 1,485 but a review during a legal challenge found that just 996 were valid. That left her four names short in her bid for a second four-year term.

Last week, Singer equated her legal struggle to the 1965 beatings of civil-rights marchers in Selma, Ala. She received some heat for it. But Henry Nicholas, leader of the National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees, who was involved in the Civil Rights movement and marches of the 1960s, defended Singer.

(Singer worked closely with Nicholas to oppose the state law requiring voters to show photo identification at polling places. A Commonwealth Court ruling overturned that voter ID law last May.)

At the rally Nicholas hosted for Singer, the Civil Rights activist praised Singer as the one in the City Commissioner's office he could rely on.

"As long as Stephanie was there, I knew she would count the votes right," Nicholas said. "She's the bravest, courageous individual for voter's rights to be elected in this city for a long time."

Nicholas questioned one of Singer's other colleagues. Without mentioning his name, Nicholas was referring to Anthony Clark, a city commissioner who reportedly has not voted in four years.

"How can you have someone who hasn't voted in four years?"

Clark was endorsed by the Democratic party.

Common Pleas President Judge Sheila Woods-Skipper said Monday that "for the integrity of elections," she wouldn't allow Singer to go back to work until after the May 19 primary. Singer can then work until her term is up at the end of the year.

What will she do next?

"I still have time to think about that," Singer said Monday. "There's so many ways to serve."

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