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PITTSBURGH (AP) _ An independent candidate for Congress told a judge Monday that he helped some voters fill out his nominating petitions, an admission that threatens his campaign.

Senior Commonwealth Court Judge James R. Kelley on Monday began hearing a lawsuit brought by three Democrats from Mercer County who contend Steven Porter doesn't have enough valid signatures on his nominating petitions.

The Democrats want Porter off the ballot because they are concerned he will siphon votes from their candidate, Kathy Dahlkemper, in her bid to unseat seven-term incumbent U.S. Rep. Phil English, R-Pa.

Porter has run unsuccessfully against English twice before. As a Democrat in 2004 and 2006, he drew at least 40 percent of the vote despite being badly outspent by English, whose district includes much of northwestern Pennsylvania.

Porter needs 2,171 valid signatures on his nominating petitions to remain on the ballot, but on Monday he provided what could become the pivotal evidence in the case against him.

State courts have found signatures invalid if the accompanying information is filled out by someone other than the voter who signed the petition. Early in the hearing, Porter acknowledged filling out at least the hometown and date next to about 1,300 signatures, which — if true — could derail his nomination.

"You admitted that you had signed and the court understands that," Judge Kelley told Porter. "The question is going to be what develops from that."

But Kelley wasn't satisfied that a handwriting expert's report was accurate, so he insisted that Shawn Gallagher, the Democrats attorney, put on evidence about each signature being challenged. Porter spoke up during that tedious process and told the judge he reviewed the petitions in court and determined he had inserted at least the hometown and date next to 1,090 signatures, enough to leave him 13 short of the total needed to sustain his nomination.

Kelley asked Porter and Gallagher to compile a list citing precisely which signatures had personal information next to them filled out by Porter. The judge halted Monday's hearing to give Porter and Gallagher time to count those signatures individually.

It was not immediately clear when Kelley planned to rule.

Porter, a former college professor, author and composer, ran unsuccessfully four times for the New York State Senate in the 1990s. He said his first experience in politics was working on Sen. Robert Kennedy's 1968 presidential campaign.

None of the Democratic plaintiffs attended the hearing Monday.