CAMP HILL, Pa. — It’s easy to forget while listening to Josh Shapiro talk that he doesn’t face Donald Trump on the ballot next week.
During his stump speech here Thursday, the Democratic governor of Pennsylvania — widely seen as a likely 2028 presidential candidate — ripped Trump for bumbling into the Iran war. He mocked the president’s tariffs as economically illiterate. And he denounced Trump’s whole administration as a “chaotic,” “cruel” and “corrupt” mess that has threatened to undo decades of progress.
“The story of our nation has been that in every chapter of our story, it always got better,” Shapiro said at an outdoor rally of a few hundred people, held next to a local Teamsters building. “We’ve always got more free and more just. And I know right now, it feels like we’re in a moment in this chapter where we’ve taken two steps forward — but man oh man, have gotten knocked back a step.”
Drawing on the country’s founding, the governor said that a country created on the bold promise of making life better for people must now reinvigorate that dream.
“This is about doing our part, as Pennsylvanians have for the last 250 years, to be an example to the nation,” Shapiro said. “We stand on the side of freedom. We stand on the side of democracy. We stand on the side of liberty, and we vote that way, we stand that way, and we fight that way.”
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He didn’t mention his Republican opponent next week, Stacy Garrity, by name a single time, either in his speech here or during a rally earlier in Schuylkill County.
Shapiro, in an interview with The Washington Sun, said he’s taking nothing for granted in next week’s race, which polls indicate he could win by 20 percentage points or more. And he’s repeatedly dismissed talk of 2028 as premature.
“We don’t want somebody who is going to rubber-stamp whatever Donald Trump wants,” Shapiro said of Garrity. “We want someone who’s going to respect the role of the people. And I think I’ve been very clear about the stark differences between she and I.”
But the Pennsylvania Democrat also has more on the line Tuesday than most governors seeking reelection. Shapiro has invested significant time and resources toward helping four Democratic candidates take on Republican U.S. House incumbents — his rally here Thursday night was held in conjunction with Janelle Stelson, who is running against Rep. Scott Perry in a race viewed as one of 2026’s core battlegrounds.
Shapiro on Thursday was nearing the end of a 29-county, 10-day bus tour across the state, in which he was expected to eventually campaign with all four of the Democratic House candidates.
He’s also trying for a state legislative “trifecta,” giving Democrats majorities in both the Pennsylvania House and Senate for the first time since 1993. Doing so would give the governor a chance to sign into law a legislative wish list that he emphasizes would help the everyday Pennsylvanian.
But it would also give Shapiro a potentially significant platform from which he could launch a presidential campaign. Which, even as the governor denies thinking about it, is evidently on the minds of some of his supporters.
At the event in Schuylkill County, 20-year-old Ayden Rodichok told the governor he’d like to see him run for president. Rodichok was just elected chair of the Schuylkill County Young Democrats and had asked Shapiro to film a short video with him to send to its members.
Shapiro smiled and ignored Rodichok’s suggestion. But the American University student said afterward he really did think it was a good idea, saying the governor could appeal to both progressives and moderates.
“I just said it to be funny, but I would definitely vote for him for president,” Rodichok said.
Shapiro is generally seen as part of an evolving group of leading potential contenders in the 2028 Democratic primary, a list that includes Sen. Jon Ossoff, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Vice President Kamala Harris and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
The governor has never lost a statewide general election in his battleground state, winning twice for attorney general and once as a gubernatorial candidate. His electability could be a selling point for some Democratic voters. He’s also seen as more ideologically moderate than other contenders, potentially putting him at odds with some progressives.
Democratic operatives expect that the 2028 Democratic presidential primary could feature two dozen or more candidates, in what some call the most wide-open race in the party’s recent history.
Even as he dismisses questions about a potential presidential run, in the interview, Shapiro acknowledged he talks about Trump because he’s on people’s minds.
“There are a lot of people who are showing up because they’re scared about the direction our country’s heading in,” he said. “They’re angry about it. They want to do something to channel that anger, that fear, that concern, into action.”
During his speech here, Shapiro highlighted ways in which his administration had successfully stood up to the White House, including on voting rights and ICE detention centers. He also outlined how, with the help of a Democratic-held House and Senate, he would raise the minimum wage to $15, invest in housing construction and codify abortion-rights protections.
If he gets another four years as governor, Shapiro pledged he would think about nothing other than how to help Pennsylvanians — and how to keep pushing back against Trump.
“The other thing I’m thinking about,” he said, “is how to fight back against this chaos, how to stand up against the cruelty and how not to tolerate his corruption in America any longer.”
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