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With former Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar’s abrupt departure and the election tensions still high, the confirmation process for Boockvar’s successor may be the most contentious, said Khalif Ali, executive director of Common Cause in Pennsylvania. "That's going to be the spiciest," he said.

Given Ward’s and Costa’s direct relationships to the top Republican and Democrat in the Senate, respectively, the sons’ clients could get special treatment across the Legislature and a leg-up in getting their legislative priorities across the finish line, said Khalif Ali, the executive director of good-government nonprofit Common Cause PA.

“We know that nationally, about two-thirds of Americans believe that politicians ‘don’t care about people like me.’ This kind of revolving door employment reinforces that cynicism. A cooling-off period for former state legislators, before they take other state jobs, would reassure voters that public employees are working in the public’s interests,” Ali said.

Khalif Ali, executive director of Common Cause Pennsylvania, said it is up to good government groups — and citizens — to remind elected officials of their promises. “You get accustomed to doing things in a certain way with a low or middle level of accountability,” he said of elected officials. “The higher the accountability, the closer the scrutiny, and that makes people uncomfortable.”

“It is time to move past the 2020 election and work together to deal with challenges that lie ahead,” said Common Cause Pennsylvania executive director Khalif Ali. “We’re facing a continuing COVID-19 pandemic, racial injustice, an increasing budget deficit and people are struggling to make ends meet. Pennsylvanians are suffering. Let’s move forward -- with a government that is ‘of the people, by the people’ and ‘for the people.’ Common Cause calls on our elected officials to demonstrate the type of leadership that will re-instill confidence in our democracy. Pennsylvanians deserve nothing less.”

Khalif Ali, the executive director of the nonpartisan good-government group Common Cause PA, said he’s already preparing for some fraught months as lawmakers hash out their differences.