PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Attorney General Josh Shapiro is the frontrunner in the Pennsylvania governor’s race. The Democrat faced no primary challenger, and polling is showing him with a significant lead over his GOP opponent, state Sen. Doug Mastriano.
Shapiro hits on several of the same issues as Mastriano. The big difference is in the approach.
“I’ve been running as a candidate who’s going to bring people together to tackle these big challenges,” Shapiro said, listing those “big challenges” as high-quality, properly funded public education; public safety; and economic growth.
While Mastriano’s strategy has been to rally his supporters by making it “us versus them,” Shapiro paints himself as the guy who can make government work.
“That’s what people want from their government,” he said. “They want it to work. They want it to make their lives better. They want to know that you’re going to check your partisan label at the door — take off that red jersey or blue jersey and just put on the Pennsylvania jersey — and get the job done for people.”
Shapiro points to his time as a Montgomery County commissioner from 2011 to 2017.
“We cut spending and increased output,” he recalled. “We earned a AAA bond rating. We ran a fiscally responsible government that filled a $10 million budget hole that I inherited.”
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Shapiro acknowledged that balancing a county budget may not get a lot of attention in modern-day politics — but, he said, compare that to the headlines surrounding Mastriano.
“I would argue he gets a whole lot of attention for all the wrong reasons,” he said of his challenger, “for courting white supremacists, for wearing a Confederate uniform — as a grown man, not as part of some reenactment. For his extreme views on a woman’s right to choose.”
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Addressing public safety, Shapiro said he would work to hire more police officers to fill gaps across the state. However, he added, “we also have to understand that there are drivers of violence in our communities that can’t be addressed simply through law enforcement.”
That includes making sure people have access to decent jobs, high-quality education, and mental health and addiction treatment.
Mastriano has said Shapiro is soft on crime, posing him as a criminal justice reformer along the lines of Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner. However, Shapiro differs clearly from Krasner, especially on prosecuting gun laws.
“You pick up a gun illegally — because you’re a prohibited purchaser, you’re a felon — you need to be held accountable,” Shapiro said. “There has to be accountability, and that is what I want to see in every jurisdiction across Pennsylvania.”
Asked if he thinks that level of accountability is happening in Philadelphia right now, he said,
“I think that’s up to the good people of Philadelphia — to make a determination as to who should lead them.”
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Shapiro seems to consider the likelihood of going up against Mastriano in a debate to be pretty dim.
“My opponent blew those good faith negotiations up when he said that he would not submit to questions from local media here in Pennsylvania,” he argued. “And the only way he would debate is if he got to pick the moderator, which is just ridiculous.”
Mastriano has shut out most journalists, favoring only right-wing media. He has argued Shapiro and traditional media are the extremists, and he wouldn’t get a fair shake in a typical debate without a hand-picked moderator.
Instead of a debate, Shapiro said he’s making himself available to local media to answer questions.
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