(R-Pennsylvania House of Representatives, District 10)
Aaron Bernstine is a prolific joiner of COVID Denial Facebook groups, belonging to 16 such groups. He joined his first COVID Denial group in December 2020, well into the first wave of COVID Denial mobilization.
In September 2021, he joined three more such groups during the second wave of COVID Denial growth. Then, in early 2022, Bernstine joined 12 different groups. The first four groups he joined using his personal Facebook account. Later he joined COVID Denial groups through his “Aaron Bernstine for State Representative” account, giving it the appearance of a campaign-related move. Almost all of the COVID Denial groups he joined are in Pennsylvania.
Befitting such memberships, Bernstine co-sponsored HB 2013, a bill supporting a “medical freedom” amendment to the state constitution to ban vaccine and mask mandates.[70] In addition, Bernstine co-sponsored an anti-mask bill, another bill barring vaccine mandates, and a bill against “vaccine passports.”[71]
Bernstine’s COVID Denial group memberships followed his joining the Tea Party in Pa’s 13th Congressional District (392 members) in 2019 and two anti-abortion groups in 2020.[72] Bernstine signed on as a co-sponsor of a bill banning abortions when a fetal heartbeat is detectible.[73]
Another avenue of Bernstine’s excursion into the far right has been through Second Amendment activism. Bernstine is a member of the Facebook group Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (8,567 members). This far-right group declares, “Let’s destroy ‘gun control’” and promotes the false claim that gun regulations in the U.S. are akin to WWII-era German Nazi gun laws.[74] In addition, Bernstine announced his campaign endorsement by Gun Owners of America, the far-right group long led by militia advocate Larry Pratt. GOA’s endorsement proclaims that Bernstine “is the only candidate in this race who has strongly and successfully advocated to protect our 2nd Amendment Rights.”[75]
Bernstine was also a primary sponsor of a “Constitutional carry” bill to allow the public carrying of handguns, either openly or concealed, without a license or permit.[76] And Bernstine signed on as a sponsor of a bill to bar “any Federal law which attempts to register, restrict or ban a firearm or limit the size of a magazine of a firearm…unenforceable in this Commonwealth.”[77] He also supported a bill modeled on the “Second Amendment Protection Act,” barring state and federal officials or employees from enforcing gun regulations.[78]
Not to be left out of other far-right efforts, Bernstine also signed on as a sponsor of voter suppression bills supporting voter identification requirements and opposing mail-in ballots; an anti-immigrant bill to make English the official state language; and a right-to-work-style anti-union bill.[79]