Free Republic

Below is my column in Fox.com on the recent decision of Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro to join the ranks of Democrats calling for packing the Supreme Court. It is a disappointing moment for many of us who hoped that Shapiro could offer a moderate voice in the upcoming elections, resisting the rise of socialists and communists in his party. Instead, he proved to be just another politician thinking of the next election rather than the next generation. Here is the column: Gov. Josh Shapiro (D. Pa.) has finally reached his Terry Malloy moment. In the classic movie, On the Waterfront,...

Pennsylvania will not participate in President Donald Trump’s 250th celebration of the nation’s birthday on the National Mall, Gov. Josh Shapiro confirmed in a new interview. “This president routinely makes patriotism partisan and personal, and it shouldn’t be that way,” Shapiro told The New Republic, which noted that Trump has described his Great American State Fair as “the most spectacular Trump rally of them all.”

Political analyst Mark Halperin joins Michael Smerconish to discuss what recent Democratic primary results could mean for 2028, why Bernie Sanders may still be a major force in Democratic politics, and whether the party's energy now belongs to its progressive wing. The conversation explores Josh Shapiro, Gavin Newsom, AOC, Ro Khanna, Democratic Socialists, Israel, generational divides, and the battle for the soul of the Democratic Party.

Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) appeared to position himself as a Make America Healthy Again (MAHA)-style Democrat as speculation continues to swirl about potential 2028 presidential contenders. In a Monday episode of GZERO Media, Shapiro claimed that Democrats are the party of “real freedom,” including allowing parents to make their own decisions about vaccines for their children. “I think Democrats are the party of real freedom, real freedom that allows women to make decisions over their own bodies, allows parents like me and my wife, Lori, to make decisions over what vaccines our kids are going to be able to get,”...

Democrats still searching for a way out of the rubble of the 2024 election got a peek in Tuesday’s primaries of what their voters want for the future. The races spanned a mix of competitive and safe-blue seats across six states — including a pair of crucial swing states. The result: A slate of disparate candidates who won’t give them a much clearer sense of their future. State Rep. Chris Rabb, a progressive firebrand and self-styled “rabble-rouser,” won the open primary for the bluest House district in the country in Philadelphia. In a nearby Pennsylvania House battleground, Democrats nominated Bob...

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic nominee for vice president last cycle, opted to fly to Maine to stump for Graham Platner, an oyster farmer who is running for Senate and who has a Nazi tattoo. Several members of Congress responded. “Don’t forget to ask him about his Nazi tattoo,” stated Rep. Pat Fallon (R-Texas). “Can you let him know there’s ways to remove the Nazi tattoos from his chest?” asked Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.). “In case it wasn’t clear before why Kamala Harris selected Tim Walz over Josh Shapiro. This is who they are,” the Republican Jewish Coalition stated....

Gov. Josh Shapiro reacted swiftly to news that President Donald Trump had signed an executive order attempting to restrict voting rights, blasting it with a post on the governor’s social media pages: “President Trump can sign whatever the hell he wants to, but it won’t change the Constitution. The authority to set our election rules belongs to the states — and as Governor, I will protect your right to vote. That includes your right to vote by mail." Trump’s order would create a nationwide list of eligible voters and restrict mail-in voting, among other restrictions. Under the order, the Department...

Democratic strategists are reportedly pushing for the 2028 presidential candidate to be a "straight, White, Christian man" after recent losses, an Axios report alleged. "Some top Democrats are quietly debating a fraught question: whether the party's best bet for winning back the presidency in 2028 is to nominate a man — perhaps a straight, White, Christian man," Axios reported on Sunday. "Their fear, divulged with dismay in group chats, at cocktail parties and increasingly in public, is that parts of the electorate are too biased to support a woman or other diverse candidate for president," the report continued. The report...

Shapiro faces lawsuit over $830K property after allegedly using state police to bar neighbors from their own land

Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro has claimed in his forthcoming memoir that 2024 Democratic nominee Kamala Harris’ campaign asked him if he had ever worked as a “double agent for Israel” while vetting him as a potential running mate.Shapiro, who is Jewish, wrote in “Where We Keep the Light” that he told his interrogator, former Biden White House counsel Dana Remus, that he found the question offensive and was told, “Well, we have to ask.” According to the New York Times, which obtained an advance copy of Shapiro’s book, Remus then asked if the governor had ever “communicated with an...

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro claimed that former Vice President Kamala Harris' election team asked whether he was an "agent of the Israeli government" while discussing his potential as a vice presidential candidate.

Democrat Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro has alleged that staffers for former Vice President Kamala Harris questioned whether he was a double agent of Israel when vetting him as a potential 2024 running mate. Writing in his new memoir, Where We Keep the Light, the prominent Democrat governor alleged that the former vice president’s vetting team scrutinized his views on Israel, mostly due to his being Jewish. “Had I been a double agent for Israel?” Shapiro wrote in describing his offended response to a last-minute question from the vetting team. When he called out the question for its obvious antisemitic overtones,...

I Asked AI To Predict The 2028 Election Map... Jaw Dropping Results | 15:24Election Time | 370K subscribers | 439,307 views | December 20, 2025

Pa. Gov. Josh Shapiro will soon become the top-earning governor in the U.S. after an automatic cost-of-living pay bump goes into effect on Jan. 1. Shapiro, a Democrat up for re-election next year who is often named as a 2028 presidential contender, was already the second-highest paid state leader after New York Gov. Kathy Hochul. At about $245,000 this year, Shapiro earned about $5,000 less than Hochul, whose salary, according to state law, for the past few years has been $250,000. But along with dozens of other Keystone State officials of both major parties, the new year will bring Shapiro...

Ruh-roh. Sounds like trouble in Democrat Land. Seems Josh Shapiro caught wind of some things Kamala Harris wrote about him in her memoir, things he considers LIES. --SNIP-- Harris wrote that the governor wanted to be “in the room for every decision” if she became president, adding that he often hijacked conversations and frequently needed to be told he wouldn’t have equal power.

Cody Balmer pleaded guilty to all counts, including attempted first-degree murder, dozens of arson-related charges, and terrorism The suspect in the arson of the Pennsylvania governor's mansion in April pleaded guilty to all charges on Tuesday.Cody Balmer, 38, of Harrisburg, appeared in person for the court proceeding, which started around 8:30 am Eastern Time at the Dauphin County Courthouse in Harrisburg, local news outlet WHP reported.Balmer pleaded guilty to all counts, including attempted first-degree murder, dozens of arson-related charges, and terrorism.Balmer called 911 on the night of the arson and admitted to setting fire to Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro's...

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, during an appearance on Meet the Press with Kristen Welker, said the Trump administration is trying to “stifle dissent” following ABC’s decision to suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show. “Without question, they’re trying to stifle dissent,” Shapiro said after noting that selectively firing people for their viewpoints is “dangerous.” The indefinite suspension of Kimmel’s show came after his Monday night monologue about the 22-year-old man accused of shooting and killing right-wing activist Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University. On Wednesday afternoon, Federal Communications Commission chair Brendan Carr on a conservative podcast threatened to cancel ABC affiliate broadcast...

Kamala Harris settled on picking Tim Walz to be her running mate last year because she felt Americans were too racist, antisemitic and homophobic to accept her preferred option – Pete Buttigieg. In an excerpt from the former vice president’s forthcoming book, “107 Days,” obtained by The Atlantic magazine, Harris describes Buttigieg as her “first choice” but later deemed the openly gay former transportation secretary to be “too big of a risk” on the ticket. Buttigieg “would have been an ideal partner —if I were a straight white man,” Harris wrote. “But we were already asking a lot of America:...

Last night, Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner spoke at a town hall meeting at a church in Kingsessing, one of several appearances he’s scheduled to make this week. The topic, in part, is the Trump administration’s repeated threats to send National Guard troops to major American cities. ---SNIP--- Scales went on to argue that “lawless Larry, crumb bum Krasner” was only speaking about the National Guard situation in order to “distract the people of this city from his failures.”

Pennsylvania’s Democrat Gov. Josh Shapiro is extremely aggrieved by President Donald Trump pointing to leftist violence and referring to individuals perpetrating it as “scum.” Shapiro attempted to spread blame around by stating that “no one party is immune from political violence.” […] “We are at an inflection point in America. Violence transcends party lines — and the way to address it and have true peaceful debate is for leaders to speak and act with moral clarity. That needs to start with the President,” he said, placing blame on Trump and completely ignoring the fact that Kirk did just that —...