LOCK HAVEN, Pennsylvania — Josh Shapiro may be heavily favored to win reelection as Pennsylvania governor, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot on the line for him this year.
The swing-state Democrat, an observant Jew who was targeted in an antisemitic arson attack last year, was considered as a running-mate to then-presidential candidate Kamala Harris in 2024, and is widely seen as a likely candidate himself in 2028.
He has stood out among presidential hopefuls in his party for his continued support for Israel. A memoir published earlier this year discussed his Judaism at length and said that Harris’s vetting team had asked him whether he had at any time “been a double agent for Israel.”
Shapiro is just beginning to hit the campaign trail, and wants voters to give Democrats control of the Pennsylvania state legislature for the first time in decades. And he’s pushing his favored candidates in competitive congressional primaries, an attempt to mold his party’s slate in the midterm elections that will determine control of Washington.
All of this means that, much like other potential Democratic presidential candidates, Shapiro is testing his political capital in ways that could shape his future and the party’s.
Illinois Governor JB Pritzker, who is also Jewish, successfully boosted his favored candidate in his state’s US Senate primary. Maryland Governor Wes Moore failed to convince lawmakers to redraw the state’s congressional map, while California Governor Gavin Newsom achieved redistricting through a voter referendum last year.
Shapiro brushed off questions — and Republican criticism — about burnishing his credentials for a White House run.
“The only thing I am focused on is beating my opponent for governor and helping other Democrats get elected here and sending a clear message to [US President] Donald Trump that the chaos, cruelty and corruption that he’s been engaged in is not something that we support here in Pennsylvania,” Shapiro told The Associated Press after speaking to Democrats at a packed coffee shop in small-town Lock Haven.
Shapiro has never said whether he’s interested in running for president. But he does say he wants a voice in his party’s future. Democrats need to figure out how to “get stuff done” to make people’s lives better, he said, and he wants to be “part of that conversation.”
Stacy Garrity, the Republican state treasurer who is running for governor, said Shapiro can’t hide his ambition — and it’s bad for the state.
“We all know that he’s more interested in Pennsylvania Avenue than helping Pennsylvania families,” she said in an interview. “He thinks if he can hand Pennsylvania on a platter to the Democratic Party, then maybe they take a harder look at him.”
A chance to demonstrate strength
They just might.
Pennsylvania is a hard state to succeed in politically, and Democrats around the country are taking note of Shapiro because of that, said Paul Begala, a Democratic campaign strategist, commentator and senior aide to Bill Clinton when he was president.
The election gives Shapiro an opportunity to demonstrate strength.
“Right now, Democrats, the thing they want the most is a winner, and a very close second is a fighter,” Begala said. “This election is an opportunity for him to show that.”
Shapiro is one of the nation’s most prominent Jewish politicians as antisemitism surges across America, and he’s made his religion central to his political identity — what he calls living his faith “out loud.”
A political moderate, he stands out in part for the scrutiny drawn to his center-left politics around the State of Israel. When the Harris team asked him, “Have you ever been an agent of the Israeli government?” he wrote, he took umbrage at the question.
Though he declined to explicitly call the remark antisemitic, he said he “told her how offensive the question was,” and said the episode “said a lot about some of the people around the VP.”
A supporter of the two-state solution, Shapiro defended Israel’s right to defend itself after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attack. He has also voiced concern for Palestinian civilians and criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a “dangerous and destructive force.” He has drawn progressive ire for his criticism of anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian campus protests.
In a recent interview on the All-In podcast, Shapiro said: “On antisemitism, there should be no nuance,” but that “we have to protect a place for nuance when it comes to Mideast policy.”
The governor was also harshly critical of the US-Israeli war with Iran, which he dubbed a “war of choice,” and entertained the possibility that Netanyahu had “bullied” Trump into launching it.
Ahead of this year’s campaign, Shapiro put his stamp on the Pennsylvania Democratic Party by getting committee people to elect his handpicked chair and plunging more than $900,000 so far this election cycle into the organization’s accounts.
He’s on track to break his own state fundraising record and tells voters that Pennsylvania is the “center of the political universe” in the fight for control of the US House.
Democrats want to flip four House seats in Pennsylvania on route to a hoped-for majority in the 435-seat body. Shapiro already cut an ad for Bob Brooks, president of the state firefighters’ union, who is running in a hotly contested four-way primary for the chance to challenge freshman Republican US Rep. Ryan Mackenzie.
Contested primaries and GOP surrogates
Shapiro’s endorsements haven’t scared off Democratic rivals.
Ryan Crosswell, a former federal prosecutor running against Brooks, issued a campaign memo that — in a veiled reference to the governor — said Crosswell has “no party machine behind him, no power broker network, no favors to call in.”
For his part, Shapiro said, “I’m just focused on trying to elevate good people. Hopefully they’ll all win.”
Republicans, meanwhile, have their own surrogates.
Garrity said the White House asked her for a list of people she wants to visit Pennsylvania.
Trump, US Vice President JD Vance and a number of Cabinet secretaries have already visited the state’s contested congressional districts. Earlier this month, US House Speaker Mike Johnson made a fundraising swing through Pennsylvania.
It’s quite likely Johnson will be back: Pennsylvania was his last campaign stop before the 2024 election.
Trump and Vance could return, too, and in the meantime, the president is keeping an eye on Pennsylvania. On Tuesday night, he took to social media to take credit for a decision by owners of two coal-fired power plants not to close in what he called a “BIG WIN for the Great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, which I love.”
Shapiro starts hitting the campaign trail
As he begins to campaign, Shapiro is proving himself to be a draw even in Pennsylvania’s out-of-the-way areas. Earlier this month, he helped pack a ballroom for Centre County Democrats and the coffee shop for Clinton County Democrats.
“I saw brand-new people, I saw people who have not been engaged in the party in years,” Bre Brannan, Clinton County’s Democratic Party chair, said. The crowd included Republicans and independents, too, she said.
With a Democratic “trifecta,” Shapiro tells audiences, he could get more done, citing legislation Republicans have stalled. That includes raising Pennsylvania’s rock-bottom minimum wage and expanding legal protections for LGBT residents. He also has a housing affordability plan he’s pushing this year.
Consolidating control of the state Legislature would be no small feat. Democrats hold a one-seat majority in the state House and haven’t held the state Senate majority in over three decades.
Few Democrats in the party’s 2028 presidential sights have an opportunity to demonstrate political strength and party-building aptitude in swing states.
The opportunity could help Shapiro prove his mettle when the presidential campaign season cranks up and would-be candidates go in search of institutional support, endorsements and donor commitments.
Pouring money into down-ballot races and flipping seats may not help Shapiro with the average voter. But activists, donors and other elected officials care a great deal about that, strategists say.
Success would strengthen Shapiro’s hand at a time when candidates are trying to win the “perception campaign” that they are the strongest candidate, Democratic campaign strategist Mike Mikus said.
“It doesn’t guarantee anything,” Mikus said. “But it is definitely something to bring to the table when you’re lining up donors, endorsements and finance chairs, things like that. It’s compelling to them.”
Source:
www.timesofisrael.com
