This is very inside baseball when it comes to elections, so I don’t expect everyone to be interested in this, but it is important.
Since the 2020 primary election, Montgomery County has posted an online list of everyone who has filed to run for office on the designated date. This list is referred to as the unofficial list of candidates. In 2025, the county only posted the list late on a Friday evening after inquiries about why it hadn’t been posted and just two business days before the deadline to contest candidate petitions.
The process of a candidate getting on a ballot happens fairly fast, just about 30 days. The 2025 petition circulation and filing period ran from February 18th to March 11th. These petitions can be challenged until March 18th. For example, if a candidate files a petition and people who do not live in the designated area sign it, it can be thrown out, and the candidate may not qualify for the ballot.
Since 2020, the unofficial list of candidates has been posted online for every primary and general election (see evidence below). Last week, local politicos began expressing concern that the list was unavailable online (please note that it was available in-person at the Voter Services office in Norristown).
On Friday, March 14th, MoreThanTheCurve.com inquired with Montgomery County about the list’s availability online. Below is the back-and-forth.
MoreThanTheCurve.com at 5:01 p.m.: “Montgomery County has yet to release a list of candidates (as other counties have). With it now 5:00 p.m. on March 14th and the deadline to object to petitions being on March 18th, does the county intend to extend that deadline? Also, curious as to what has caused the delay in releasing the list?”
Montgomery County at 6:56 p.m.: “The list has been available since the filing deadline at the Voter Services office.”
MoreThanTheCurve.com at 7:01 p.m.: “It’s not going to be available online?”
Montgomery County at 8:23 p.m.: Montgomery County emailed the list to MoreThanTheCurve.com with no comment.
MoreThanTheCurve.com at 8:25 p.m.: “Who made the decision to not put it online? It has been available online every election since 2020.”
Montgomery County did not answer the question.
The provided list for the 2025 primary has a disclaimer that it has not been proofread or checked for accuracy and that it was only being offered online as a “courtesy.”
But don’t worry. While Montgomery County employees didn’t have time to proof the list of candidates, they did find time this weekend to drive a van in the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in Conshohocken.
All the talk out of the two Democratic Montgomery County Commissioners Neil “Election Expert” Makhija and Jamila Winder about equity and making elections more accessible, and their administration has the audacity to refer to the straightforward task of uploading a list of candidates to a website as a “courtesy.”
While the county isn’t legally required to post the list online, it has done so faithfully for the four previous election cycles. Suddenly resisting the posting of the list, and only at the very last opportunity, raises some interesting questions.
How does not posting it make the election process more transparent? How does it make election information more accessible?
The primary election is May 20.
