ALLENTOWN, Pa. — On a recent Sunday afternoon, while other ambitious Democratic politicians traverse the country and take to social media to rile up the party’s progressive base, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro spent time taking photos and chatting with attendees at a Latino street festival in a county that Donald Trump won two years ago.
The contrast defines the central gamble of Shapiro’s looming 2028 presidential ambitions, according to a profile in The Wall Street Journal.
Known for a centrist streak and what he calls a “Get S— Done” mantra, Shapiro has established himself as a popular moderate in a divided purple state, the Journal reported. He eschews daily public spats with Trump that have raised the national profiles of other Democratic governors such as California’s Gavin Newsom and Illinois’s JB Pritzker. Trump has largely steered clear of Philadelphia and other Pennsylvania cities in his immigration crackdown, the Journal noted.
“I never really spent a whole lot of time thinking about Donald Trump and what he did” in 2024, Shapiro said in an interview with the Journal. “I just spent time on figuring out how I could get stuff done for this community.”
Shapiro, 52, has called out what he describes as “the chaos, cruelty and corruption coming out of Washington, D.C.” and has criticized U.S. military strikes in Iran and pushed back on the administration’s immigration crackdown, the Journal reported. But he picks his spots.
His allies acknowledged it is an open question whether his brand can prevail in a Democratic primary.
“A lot of Democrats are looking for candidates who are angry, who exude furor, and they say they want to fight,” Larry Ceisler, a Philadelphia-based public-affairs executive and Democrat who has known Shapiro for decades, told the Journal. “Gov. Shapiro is a serious person, and so the question is: Do Democrats want serious people who are going to get things done? Or are they basically looking for the Democratic version of Donald Trump?” Ceisler said. “Gov. Shapiro is not that. Nor could he be, nor could he even pretend.”
Shapiro’s popularity in his home state is not in question. He won Pennsylvania by nearly 15 percentage points in 2022. He had no primary challenger in May. His approval often lands at around 60%, according to the Journal. He has aggressively fundraised, with more than $37 million in cash on hand, according to his campaign’s latest filings. Polls show the pro-business governor with a double-digit lead over his Republican opponent, State Treasurer Stacy Garrity, the Journal reported.
Shapiro’s visit to Allentown came the weekend before the primary, in the heart of a Republican-held competitive congressional district he is hoping to flip. There, he endorsed Bob Brooks, president of the Pennsylvania Professional Fire Fighters Association, wading into a contested primary that upset some in the district. Shapiro said his endorsement of Brooks centered on his “special” relationship with the firefighter after an assassination attempt in 2025, when a man set ablaze the governor’s residence while he and his family slept inside.
Garrity has cast Shapiro as a governor more focused on his presidential ambitions than Pennsylvania.
“Josh Shapiro has collected millions in campaign contributions from liberal billionaires, and he is the darling of the national Democrat establishment,” Garrity said last month when she officially became the GOP gubernatorial nominee, the Journal reported.
Primary-night results offered early signs of Shapiro’s influence: three of the congressional candidates he endorsed won their contested primaries, while a fourth did not have a primary opponent, the Journal reported. Democratic Rep. Matt Bradford, majority leader in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, credited Shapiro with being “able to get voters without chasing voters away.”
At the Fiesta on Hamilton, Shapiro spoke against the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown and the fear in communities such as Allentown, a Latino-majority city, the Journal reported. In quick conversations with supporters, he also spoke about affordability, housing and education. Addressing thousands of attendees on stage before the merengue singer Milly Quezada performed, Shapiro kept his message brief: “I got your back, and I will always have your back.”
Some Democrats have said Shapiro is not progressive enough, noting his support for Israel and what they see as a long pattern of political ambition. Chuck Rocha, a Democratic strategist, told the Journal that Shapiro’s views on the Israel-Palestine conflict put him “on the wrong side of a lot of Democratic base voters” but likely better position him in a general election.
Allentown Mayor Matt Tuerk, a Democrat, attributed part of Shapiro’s success to his “competitive fire” and praised his ability to speak to different kinds of Americans, which “sets him apart from a lot of other Democrats that are still finding their voice,” the Journal reported.
Rocha said having executive experience and blue-collar bona fides will be huge assets in the 2028 field. “He’s a good-looking white guy from a blue-collar state,” Rocha said. “That has a lot of upside.”
Shapiro would not discuss his plans for 2028 in the interview. He said he appreciates voters telling him they want him to run for higher office but brought the conversation back to his mantra of “Get S— Done.”
“That’s really humbling, and I don’t take that lightly,” Shapiro said. “It is why I work my tail off every single day for them.”