Texas primary voters of both parties voted with cool heads Tuesday, rejecting candidates who appealed to their parties’ bases with more inflammatory styles that could have proved riskier in a general election.
But challenges remain for Democrat James Talarico — who won the primary outright on a unifying message of reaching out to all Texans — and for Republican Sen. John Cornyn, who nosed ahead of firebrand Attorney General Ken Paxton but now faces a punishing May 26 runoff against him.
Democrats face an uphill battle to flip a Senate seat in the red state no matter what happens in the runoff, as they mount their long-shot bid to retake the Senate in November. The chamber is currently controlled by Republicans, 53-47, and Democrats would have to flip several deep-red states like Texas to regain control.
The next few months will determine how well-positioned Texas Democrats are to regain a Senate seat that has eluded them for more than 30 years, as the party hopes unusually high voter enthusiasm and weariness with President Donald Trump could fuel their comeback.Talarico in the coming months must work to unite the party by attracting Black voters who strongly backed his opponent, all while fending off coming attacks from the right painting him as a radical.
And Cornyn’s political survival may depend on the actions of someone who is notoriously hard to predict or corral — Trump. The president said Wednesday that he would soon endorse one candidate and that the other should quit the race. If he does not get Trump’s endorsement, Cornyn may struggle to clear the runoff, and either way the next few months will be a divisive slugfest between two Republicans with large megaphones.
“We are not going to go quietly, and we are not going to let you buy the seat,” Paxton said at his election-night party in Dallas, referencing the tens of millions of dollars Cornyn and his allies poured into the race.
FILE – This photo combination shows Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, left, in Dallas and Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, in Austin, Texas, both on March 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez, Jack Myer)
Cornyn, a fourth-term senator who is widely considered to be a stronger general-election candidate than the scandal-plagued Paxton, fell short of the 50% mark that would have avoided a runoff. Paxton was impeached by the GOP-controlled Texas House in May 2023 on charges of bribery but was acquitted by the Senate.
Cornyn warned Paxton that “judgment” was coming for him. “I refuse to allow a flawed, self-centered, and shameless candidate like Ken Paxton to risk everything we’ve worked so hard to build,” he told reporters.
The bitter intra-Republican warfare marked a stark contrast to the Democratic side of the ledger, where Rep. Jasmine Crockett set aside her earlier attacks on Talarico — and a legal challenge she filed Tuesday after voters were turned away from polling places in her Dallas district —and urged Democrats to come together Wednesday.
“Texas is primed to turn blue and we must remain united because this is bigger than any one person,” Crockett wrote in a social media post.
Talarico also urged unity, telling his supporters Tuesday, “The stakes in Texas are too high for division.”
Mudslinging in the final weeks of the race may have caused some damage that Talarico will need to repair ahead of November, however. Crockett called the argument that Talarico was more electable than her a “dog whistle” and slammed him for not condemning ads run by a super PAC that supported him as “straight-up racist.” (Talarico does not control the super PAC, and the group denied darkening Crockett’s skin in an ad.)
Crockett ran strong with the state’s Black voters, while Talarico appeared to run away with the Latino vote in the state. He beat Crockett by 30 percentage points or more in 21 counties that are more than 75% Latino. In counties that were 20% or more Black, Crockett won by 25 percentage points.
Nancy Zdunkewicz, a Texas Democratic pollster, said she believed that much of the Crockett-Talarico tensions played out online rather than on the campaign trail and that the primary electorate was not divided.
“She has conceded graciously, and I don’t want to overstate any damage done simply because of the social media dialogue, which was unnoticed by voters,” she said.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris, who backed Crockett in the final days of the race, urged voters to unify. “I congratulate James Talarico for his win, and the inspiring campaign he continues to build,” she said in a statement. “I offer him my full support in the months ahead.”
Republicans have a while to go before they can start their postprimary healing process, a delay that could dampen enthusiasm in November. It is also unclear whether Republicans will continue to vote with their heads instead of their hearts in May by backing Cornyn. Runoffs tend to feature a smaller, more intense group of voters compared with regular primaries, which could benefit Paxton. And it remains an open question whether Trump will support Cornyn, a nod that could put him over the top.
Political analysts also do not know if the roughly 13% of Republicans who voted for GOP Rep. Wesley Hunt, who failed to make the runoff, will show up again in May and, if so, which candidate they would favor.
Cornyn’s allies have warned the president that should Paxton be their nominee, the party would have to spend $200 million to get him over the finish line — a haul that would take away from other competitive Senate races Republicans are defendingin Maine, North Carolina, and Ohio. Paxton historically has not been a strong fundraiser, and Democrats have nominated Talarico, whom they see as a stronger candidate than Crockett in the general election and who may take more resources to beat.
Cornyn has Trump-connected allies on his side as they make this pitch, including Trump’s former campaign manager Chris LaCivita, who is running his super PAC, and Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio.
Republicans in the state are sounding the alarm about record-breaking primary turnout for Democrats, which they see as a signifier of high enthusiasm going into November. Ross Hunt, a Republican pollster, called the turnout “a code red alert for Texas Republicans” in an analysis he published earlier this week. He predicted Democrats have added more than 480,000 voters to their turnout in the fall.
“Republicans will need to do everything right this fall: we will need to select the best nominees for the General Election, maximize GOP turnout, practice intense message discipline, and have a clear-eyed and dispassionate understanding of where the new front line of defense stands after March 3rd,” he wrote.
It was at the end of last year in the hazy stretch between Christmas and New Year’s when time doesn’t feel real, and some of Philly’s top Democrats were huddled around a secret proposal, racing to meet a deadline.
The group — convened by Mayor Cherelle L. Parker, her aides, and some key Philadelphia boosters — was preparing a lengthy bid to bring the Democratic National Convention back to the city in either 2028 or 2032, a potential economic boon and a chance to show off in front of lawmakers, celebrities, and international media.
The confidential proposal to the Democratic National Committee included everything from the city’s hotel space to police outfitting to nitty-gritty details about the electrical grid and voltage capacity at Xfinity Mobile Arena. SEPTA officials drafted a section about the public transportation Philadelphia could offer visitors, and tourism agencies chipped in with insights on hotels and restaurants.
David L. Cohen, a longtime Democratic fundraiser and the president of the recently formed nonprofit host committee called Pick Pennsylvania, said that while the mayor led the effort, the bid also emphasized the “unity of the region and the commonwealth.”
“She wanted it to be really clear this is more than a Philadelphia bid,” he said. “This is a unified Pennsylvania bid.”
It appears the Democratic National Committee was impressed. On Monday, the DNC announced that it is considering five cities, including Philadelphia, to host the 2028 convention, where a Democratic presidential nominee will be coronated. The party is also looking closely at Atlanta, Denver, Chicago, and Boston to hold the early August event.
What comes next is a campaign to lure the convention to Philly, complete with a carefully coordinated public relations effort and a significant fundraising push. Philadelphia’s host committee for 2016, the last time the city held a presidential nominating convention, raised more than $85 million.
The DNC has asked host cities to raise $5 million before being selected. Philly’s fundraising, Cohen said, “will be substantially higher than that number.”
In this 2021 file photo, David L. Cohen speaks as Philadelphia Soccer 2026, the city’s World Cup 2026 bid committee, launched an interactive exhibit at the Independence Visitors Center in Philadelphia. He is now heading an effort to bring the Democratic National Convention to Philadelphia.
Cohen, a former Comcast executive and erstwhile chief of staff to former mayor Ed Rendell, is leading the effort alongside Daniel J. Hilferty, now the CEO of Comcast Spectacor.
Hilferty and Cohen have worked together repeatedly over the last two decades to bring major events to Philadelphia, including a successful bid to become one of a handful of North American cities to host World Cup games this year.
Also involved in coordinating the DNC proposal was Erin Wilson, a Philadelphia native who was a top aide to former Vice President Kamala Harris. She was the national political director for former President Joe Biden’s campaign and planned his 2021 inauguration.
When the DNC comes to town
DNC officials are expected to make a final decision on the 2028 site later this year. That call will likely be made by chair Ken Martin in consultation with top advisers and the committee’s Technical Advisory Group, which assesses logistics and operational matters.
Philadelphia could also have an advocate in State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta, who represents parts of North Philadelphia and is a DNC vice chair. He is known to have a close relationship with Martin.
Committee officials and the advisory group will tour each of the five finalist cities for a yet-to-be-scheduled site visit this spring.
If history is any indication, the city will roll out the red carpet. In 2014, when 18 members of the DNC came to Philly to check out the city ahead of the 2016 convention, the host committee spent six figures to charm them.
The trip included a tour of Philly’s most popular sites, like Reading Terminal Market and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, as well as a swanky rooftop party and a breakfast at the Comcast Center. Predictably, cheesesteaks were also involved.
“The site visits are as much about feel as they are about technical details,” Cohen said. “After site visits, the teams who are making choices leave here and they have their socks knocked off. They can’t believe how vibrant the city is.”
In this 2014 file photo, Congressman Bob Brady, left, talks with DNC CEO Amy Dacey, center, as they have lunch at Pat’s Steaks in South Philadelphia.
Ryan Boyer, the head of the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council and a close Parker ally, said one of Philadelphia’s best assets might be its mayor. Parker is an unabashed cheerleader for the city and is leading preparations for several major events this year, including World Cup games, the MLB All-Star Game, and the commemoration of America’s 250th anniversary.
“She’s the most effective advocate for bringing people together,” Boyer said, “with just her level of passion, her love of the city, and her love of the job.”
Cohen said he spoke to Parker last year about the potential to bid for the convention, and when she asked him to lead the host committee, he said yes because the city has “a serious chance.”
“As a friend and longtime supporter of hers, if I didn’t think we had a legitimate shot, I would try to talk her out of it,” Cohen said. “If anything, I have poured gasoline on her flames of enthusiasm and said, ‘We should be all in for this.’
”I said, ‘Do what you do best,’” he added. “Get everyone excited about this.’”
That means there is a chance that Shapiro, who was raised in Montgomery County and whose family still lives there, could be nominated in what is essentially his hometown.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro speaks during the Democratic National Convention Aug. 21, 2024, in Chicago.
In a letter to Martin, Shapiro wrote that Philadelphia “would see substantial economic benefits” from hosting the convention and vowed that the state would be “prepared to ensure our infrastructure, public safety agencies, workforce, and business community are equipped to host thousands of delegates and attendees.”
What’s next: a close look at security and logistics
Behind the pomp of the DNC’s spring site visit will be a serious evaluation of security, transportation, hotels, and arena logistics.
The DNC said in a statement Monday that it will value “new and innovative approaches” to hosting a large-scale event that is likely to bring thousands of tourists. In 2016, the convention drew more than 5,000 attendees and an additional 29,000 visitors — nearly 20,000 of whom were media members.
Nominating conventions are typically designated as National Special Security Events, meaning the federal government leads security because the event is deemed at high risk for terrorism or other criminal activity. That means planners need to know specifics about law enforcement staffing, gear, and other capabilities.
Placards promoting Philadelphia as the host city of the Democratic National Convention in 2016, while the Democratic National Committee was touring the city in August.
Support will also have to come from outside the city. During past conventions, federal law enforcement teamed up with Philadelphia police to secure the venue, and they were joined by officers from across the region.
The DNC also said in its announcement Monday that the committee would prioritize “the importance of forging a strong partnership between the DNC and the host city, including its community, political, and business leaders.”
To that end, the host committee and Parker asked elected officials and civic leaders from across the state to write letters of support that accompanied the city’s bid.
Authors ranged from City Council President Kenyatta Johnson, whose district includes the South Philadelphia stadium complex, to labor leaders to Democrats from the Philadelphia collar counties.
Montgomery County Commissioner Neil Makhija, who wrote a letter to the DNC boosting the bid, said it is important for the committee to see that local governments and law enforcement agencies outside the city are willing to offer support, because “pulling something like this off requires a lot of cooperation on many different fronts.”
“A real concern now when you’re thinking about hosting a political convention is ‘How are we going to manage public safety and a threat environment?’” he said. “There are a number of reasons to point to our region and see a level of collaboration that inspires confidence.”
New York Times-verified images from a scene in southern Iran are horrific. A severed arm of a child lying in the rubble. Backpacks covered in ashes. The dead in body bags. Video of rescue workers digging through the remains of what had been a modest, two-story school near a military installation in southern Iran.
Please stop for a moment and think about the babies who died over the weekend. I call them that because that’s really what they were: elementary-age schoolchildren learning their lessons on what had started as a typical school day during their holy month of Ramadan, before turning into a nightmare.
Regardless of what you think about the joint U.S.-Israeli strikes against Iran, these girls were innocents. Students ages 7-12, they didn’t deserve this. Even growing up under the horribly repressive thumb of the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, they had hopes and dreams for their lives that sadly now will never be realized. Their families must be out of their minds with grief.
It’s tempting to turn away from such a devastating tragedy, but America needs to bear witness to what has happened. President Donald Trump says the U.S. joined with Israel to bring about regime change and stop the production of nuclear weapons. Iranian security forces have reportedly killed thousands of their own people.
It’s still unclear exactly how many schoolgirls were killed, and which nation is responsible for the strike. The Times is reporting that at least 175 people altogether perished during the attack on the school, located in the city of Minab in southern Iran.
Rescue workers and residents search through the rubble in the aftermath of an Israeli-U.S. strike on a girls’ elementary school in Minab, Iran, Feb. 28.
According to the Times, the school is near a naval base where the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps is stationed. Reportedly, it was also struck that day. Various news sources reported that a spokesperson for U.S. Central Command said military officials are “aware of reports concerning civilian harm resulting from ongoing military operations” and are “looking into them.”
Meanwhile, the reports have sparked worldwide outrage. Nobel Peace Prize laureate and education activist Malala Yousafzai wrote on X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter, “I stand firmly against violence and the targeting of schools and civilians.” She was a child herself when she was shot while returning home from school in Pakistan in 2012.
Imagine the blanket news coverage that would have taken place if something even remotely like this had taken place at a school on American soil. It would have made the front page of every newspaper. But because it happened in a Muslim country thousands of miles away, it’s easier to act as if it never happened.
We can’t allow this kind of violence to be normalized.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris spoke for many of us over the weekend when she said, “Trump has dragged us into a war that we do not want.” The former Democratic presidential candidate added, “I unequivocally oppose this war of choice, and everyone should.”
Polls show most agree with Harris. Only one in four Americans approves of this war in the Middle East. I get it. We don’t want another drawn-out situation. We didn’t agree to this, and only Congress has the authority to authorize war.
We don’t even know what Trump’s endgame is, but he has let us know that the U.S. can expect more military casualties. More war means more airstrikes and more civilian fatalities — possibly even devastation like what happened at the girls’ school — where, as Yousafzai said on X, “every child deserves to live and learn in peace.”
Given the administration’s reluctance to share more about the planned scope and scale of our military engagement, there is little we can say with certainty. Except that Trump’s reckless war proves his “Board of Peace” is a farce.
Does Donald Trump have to ruin everything? The answer is obviously yes, but this one was heartbreaking. Sunday’s overtime thriller over Canada, which gave U.S. men’s hockey its first gold medal since this senior citizen was a college junior, was a howl of joy in what’s been a dire year for America. But then (taxpayer-)Ka$h Patel showed up to party, and soon Trump was on the phone, egging on the boys with misogynistic trash talk about their gold medal compatriots, the women’s hockey team. Now the men are invited to Trump’s State of the Union address, the women “had other plans,” and I almost wish our Canadian friends had won the game.
How Indiana University won a football crown and lost the plot
Indiana University’s victory flag flies over Memorial Stadium in January in Bloomington, Ind.
Even in a state where the sports miracles, from Rudy and The Knute Rockne Story to Hoosiers, are so big they tend to make it to Hollywood, there’s never been a feel-good script quite like Indiana University — with the most losses in college football history until this season, when it went 16-0 and won the national championship.
“The energy is just absolutely insane,” Katie Shin, a recent Indiana alumna, told the Athletic as thousands of fans went wild on the Bloomington campus that night, saluting Heisman Trophy quarterback Fernando Mendoza and their unsmiling genius head coach Curt Cignetti. “The whole state is just rallying around IU.”
But there’s a huge irony for anyone who’s a big fan of America’s colleges for more than just what happens on the gridiron. In the same season Indiana was slowly climbing to the top of the football polls, the flagship public university was also ranked dead last in the nation.
For something arguably more important: free speech.
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), the national campus speech group based here in Philadelphia, last fall ranked IU 255th on its 2026 ranking of universities over freedom of expression — the lowest-rated public institution in America, and only higher than the controversy-wracked private sister schools, Columbia University and Barnard College.
Interestingly, the FIRE low-ranking came after a slew of campus controversies in which the silenced speakers or protesters were all over the map ideologically — a canceled Jewish speaker and a shout down of right-wing speakers, but also draconian moves against pro-Palestinian protesters, including harsh penalties for a 2024 encampment. Last month, a federal court ruled that IU’s punishments of the Gaza campers and its anti-protest policies were unconstitutional.
FIRE’s lambasting of IU’s free speech transgressions was reported upon last Sept. 9 in the student paper, the Indiana Daily Student. The following month, school administrators ousted the faculty adviser to the IDS and told the student journalists they could no longer print the paper, and that news could only be published online. The university’s insistence that this was purely an economic move was a surprise to the ex-adviser, who sued and said he was fired “after he refused to censor the students’ work.”
It ought to go without saying that curbing the free exchange of ideas is antithetical to the most sacred values of American higher education. But the free speech mess at IU is but one controversy at an iconic heartland university that has become a poster child for the moral crisis of U.S. universities, even as it celebrates football glory.
Clearly, the leadership at IU — and this includes its board of trustees, with three new conservative, pro-MAGA members that GOP Gov. Mike Braun named in June under a law that also allowed him to boot three trustees elected by IU’s alumni — is eager to keep its pigskin prowess as the main thing America knows about the university.
The school just signed its field general, Cignetti, to a contract extension that will pay him $13.2 million a year through 2033, making him one of the three highest-paid coaches in the nation. But his new deal flabbergasted a growing number of critics, who note the big raise came as IU — just days after the new conservative trustees were named — either eliminated or made deep cuts in nearly 250 academic programs such as French, art history, geography, and East Asian studies.
Meanwhile, Cignetti isn’t the only high-profile figure at IU to see a big raise. Also this weekend, the trustees gave Whitten a $100,000 pay hike, to an even $1 million a year — citing her willingness to work with industry.
At least 250 IU alums, joined by current faculty and students, have signed on so far to an open letter and donation freeze demanding that, instead, Whitten step down. They also want the university to restore both its diversity programs and robust free speech protections, as well as the reinstatement of the three alumni trustee positions. But they are swimming against a red tide of conservatism that’s polluted the public college universe in Indiana.
Cross-state public rival Purdue University is reeling from a recent report in its hometown newspaper that the school, under pressure from conservative lawmakers, has informally banned the admission of international students from China and a slew of other countries. Students and faculty have complained of an unwritten “soft ban” on many overseas applicants, although Purdue has denied that such a policy exists.
Meanwhile, the regional campus of IU Indianapolis caused a stir and triggered a protest when it abruptly canceled the 57-year tradition of an annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. dinner — a move that was undertaken not long after the school removed campus signs that read “Black Lives Matter” and “Discrimination has no place here.”
Indiana is hardly alone. The 2025-26 academic year has been marked by similar outrages against unfettered speech and racial inclusion, especially in the most pro-Trump red states. To cite just one of many examples, the University of Texas System just adopted a new policy aimed at limiting discussion of “controversial topics” in the classroom. Isn’t that the whole point of the college experience?
The erosion of freedom at the American university has happened gradually and then suddenly, and it needs to be getting a lot more attention. That’s hard when the president is sending aircraft carriers to threaten Iran, imposing steep taxes for no reason, and generally acting and talking like the mad king he is.
Yet, nothing is more important for MAGA’s authoritarian project than what is happening at Indiana University and other college campuses right now. As I wrote in my 2022 book, After the Ivory Tower Falls, higher ed is the fulcrum of America’s political divide, now more than ever.
Every tactic — murdering the humanities and the social sciences, making campuses more white, ensuring our future elites aren’t exposed to “controversial topics” while entertaining them with the beer and circuses (a phrase, ironically, coined by an IU English professor) of big-time football — is another step toward MAGA’s strategic goal of an American electorate that cannot think critically.
The fight for the soul of Indiana University is the fight for the soul of the United States, and it’s not what’s happening inside Memorial Stadium against Ohio State or Michigan.
“We know that IU alums are smart enough to celebrate the success of the Football Hoosiers and condemn what Pamela Whitten is doing to degrade the prestige of our degrees,” the university dissidents write in their open letter. “Please help us take a stand against the debasement of our university and restore the glory of old IU.”
Yo, do this!
You might have noticed that the late Jeffrey Epstein and his randy U.K. royal pal, the artist formerly known as Prince Andrew, have been in the news a lot lately. But did you know there’s an excellent 2024 Netflix movie called Scoop about the drama behind the disastrous 2019 BBC interview that started the long downfall of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, now arrested and under a British police investigation? I watched Scoop over the weekend, and it’s both an entertaining and highly relevant journalism thriller.
Since this space is devoted to my weird entertainment choices, and not what normal people are doing, I have to share that I’ve been escaping today’s banality of evil with a deep dive into the musical world of … mass murderer Charles Manson. My all-time favorite podcast, Andrew Hickey’s A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs, did a remarkable four-parter a couple of years ago about Manson and his shockingly close ties to the Beach Boys (and others like, sigh, Neil Young) that resulted in the murder mastermind’s uncredited cowriting of their 1968 song, “Never Learn Not to Love.” There’s also a compelling detour into the life of Black music pioneer Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter, and a book recommendation that sounds equally incredible: Bring Judgment Day: Reclaiming Lead Belly’s Truth from Jim Crow’s Lies by Sheila Curran Bernard.
Ask me anything
Question: Update us on what is and what should be happening in Quakertown [please]. — @marco2751.bsky.social via Bluesky
Answer: Thanks for this, Marco, because if readers aren’t up to speed on what’s been happening in Quakertown, an exurb nearly an hour’s drive north of Philadelphia, then they need to learn. Quick version: A peaceful Friday walkout by Quakertown High School students protesting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids turned shockingly violent, highlighted by a grown man placing a teen girl in what appeared on video to be a dangerous choke hold. It turned out this man was the Quakertown police chief and interim borough manager, Scott McElree. Adding insult to injury, five students were arrested and spent the entire weekend in jail before they could see a judge. What should be done? Quakertown can’t fire McElree quickly enough. The right to peacefully assemble and protest the government is the heart of the First Amendment, and what makes America a democracy. A police chief who can’t honor the U.S. Constitution should not have a job.
What you’re saying about …
Last week’s take-a-step-back-from-the-madness question about who is the greatest living American (inspired by the passing of the Rev. Jesse Jackson) didn’t get a large response, but brought some compelling arguments. Two men were named twice: Pope Leo XIV, the Villanova alum who has shone as an advocate for immigrants and for peace on the world’s stage since last summer, and Sen. Bernie Sanders, who has never wavered in fighting for progressive values. Other suggestions included Bob Dylan, Edward Snowden, Barack Obama, and — in a show of respect for science under siege — the health experts Anthony Fauci and Peter Hotez, who, wrote Pat Eisenberg, “is trying to improve the health of Americans despite all the things the Trump administration is doing to ruin our health.”
📮 This week’s question: I’m hopefully going to be writing soon about the scourge of prediction markets like Kalshi, and more broadly, the problem of sports betting. Should these forms of gambling be banned, or at least more strictly regulated? Please email me your answer and put the exact phrase “Betting bans” in the subject line.
Backstory on what pundits don’t get about ‘28
This photo combo shows Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, left, speaking during the McIntyre-Shaheen 100 Club Dinner, April 27, 2025, in Manchester, N.H., and U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) speaking during a “Fighting Oligarchy” tour event at Arizona State University, March 20, 2025, in Tempe, Ariz.
Get 13 Democratic and left-leaning independent voters together in the same chat — as the New York Times did with a recent focus group, the latest in its running series — and you’d surely hear some harsh words about Donald Trump and the GOP. But ask them what they think about the Democratic Party, and you might want to cover your ears.
“Spineless.” “More complacent than I thought they would be.” “Paralyzed.” “Afraid.” “Incompetent.” “I guess suffocated, or given up …” “Sold out.” I’m not leaving out the positive responses, because there weren’t any. You also won’t be surprised that these 13 Democratic or aligned voters — very diverse across racial, class, and age lines — want more radical leaders who will take the party, and hopefully the nation, in a bold new direction. There was positive buzz for the likes of new New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett — anyone with fresh ideas and a willingness to mix it up with Trump. Said a 36-year-old independent woman from Washington state: “I still don’t agree with everything she’s doing, but Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a well-known name and seems to be fighting against Trump.”
I thought a lot about the Times’ focus group last week as I heard or read two veteran pundits try, at this relatively early date, to handicap the 2028 presidential race. Mark Halperin (who’s somehow still around despite this) went on POTUS radio with Michael Smerconish to defend his picks: He included ex-Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel, a center-right figure who is passionately hated by any real Democrat I’ve ever spoken with, and also overrated Kamala Harris (floating on the fumes of her name ID), as well as his No. 1 pick, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, with Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro at No. 2. He said he included AOC and upgraded Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker only because his “sources” told him to — because his sources understand the Democrats while the clueless Halperin does not.
Ditto Nate Silver, who has magically reappeared in the Times, which first made him a star in 2012. Although Silver did place AOC in second, behind Newsom, he also — much like Halperin — uprated tired conventional wisdom candidates like Shapiro (No. 6) and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (No. 4, despite being invisible recently), and grossly downrated progressive favorites like Pritzker (14) and Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy (18), as well as more interesting and unorthodox names like Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly (12) and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (15). He sees Newsom as the darling of “Resistance Libs,” the Trump-hating MS Now watchers who controversially get tagged as heavily “wine moms.” Said Silver of Newsom: “They want a fighter. And Newsom plays expertly into that.”
True, but I expect Newsom’s standing among Democratic primary voters will crumble once voters learn more about his ties to Silicon Valley billionaires, or his verbal sellouts of the transgender community, or his “meh” popularity among the Californians who know him best. Readers of this newsletter were unanimous earlier this month in not wanting Shapiro to run. I’m not going to do a numerical ranking, but I would place Pritzker, who’s made all the right moves against Trump without Newsom’s train car of baggage, and AOC, who’s making all the right enemies, including the worst Beltway journalists, as my top two. I’ve covered presidential races since 1984, and I’ve learned the only thing that matters two years out is to listen to the people. The pundits know nothing right now.
What I wrote on this date in 2019
It’s impossible to top this anniversary: The day I appeared in the Epstein files. In February 2019, with the walls closing in, Epstein’s close adviser and quasi-journalist friend, Michael Wolff, wanted to make sure he saw my Feb. 24, 2019, column about elite male impunity that mentioned him and two billionaires in his orbit: Donald Trump and New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft. What did Epstein read, assuming he clicked on it? I wrote that “this isn’t really ‘a sex scandal.’ The real scandal here is the gross imbalance of power involving women who were held in a form of human bondage to serve as objects of gratification for powerful men intoxicated by their belief they can get away with anything.”
I took a short break from the relentless anti-Trump, anti-ICE beat last week to write about the other threat to the American way of life: artificial intelligence. Rapid advances in AI technology make it clear that robots and chatbots and the like are going to upend the economy — most importantly, the job market — sooner rather than later. Can wary voters find politicians who are willing to regulate AI and its threats to employment, education, and the environment, or will pols continue to prefer Silicon Valley’s campaign donations? Over the weekend, I highlighted the recently leaked ICE blueprint for an American concentration camp in Georgia, and what that document tells us about the moral depravity of mass deportation.
In a city as large and as history-bound as Philadelphia, all big stories are inevitably local. That was never truer than at the Winter Olympics in northern Italy, especially for the most-watched event on these shores: the U.S. men’s hockey’s thrilling overtime victory over Canada. The on-ice celebration blended with copious tears as Team USA teammates went into the stands and skated back with Johnny Jr. and Noa Gaudreau, the young children of late South Jersey NHL hockey icon Johnny Gaudreau. Their dad and their uncle Matty were killed by an alleged drunk driver while cycling on a South Jersey road in August 2024, as Gaudreau was training to hopefully make this Olympic squad. The players centered the Gaudreau family and his No. 13 jersey during the gold-medal celebration, and The Inquirer’s Alex Coffey captured the whole emotional story — one you won’t read anywhere else. “This is a history book [moment] that there will be a movie about,“ sister Katie Gaudreau told Coffey. ”And in that movie, Noa and Johnny will be on the ice.” You get the big, moving stories like this, and allow us to keep covering them, when you subscribe to The Inquirer.
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The Minneapolis-based artist can’t unsee the impact ICE and directives from President Donald Trump’s administration’s have had on her hometown in recent months.
“I don’t really know anyone whose life hasn’t been affected by the occupation in a tangible way,” she said. “Many people I know are volunteering to deliver meals, patrol schools, drive folks to work, and serve as peaceful observers — which is what both Renee Good and Alex Pretti were doing when they lost their lives at the hands of ICE agents.”
The independent graphic designer thought about ways she could get involved when it hit her. She’s joining a larger tradition of subversive font design.
Haddican, whose work focuses on typography, branding, and packaging, thought back to Moontype, a font created by designer Olli Meier that autocorrects “bad words,” like hate, into “good words,” like love.
Then she thought about language and its use today.
“It’s become impossible to ignore how blatantly the Trump administration is misusing language in order to control and distort the narrative,” she said. It clicked.
“Wouldn’t it be cool if you could change someone else’s words?” Haddican said. “I decided that the best practical use of this font feature would be a practical joke.”
This month, she launched Times New Resistance, a parody of the commonly used Times New Roman font, which autocorrects a slew of specific words as they’re typed. Notably, Times New Roman is the new (and old) official font of the State Department.
Using Times New Resistance, the term ICE autocorrects to “the Goon Squad.” Trump autocorrects to “Donald Trump is a felon.” Gay becomes “gay rights are human rights.” Illegal alien becomes “human being.”
Kingsley Spencer, a creative director and designer based in Jacksonville, Fla., says using the State Department’s own font is part of what makes Haddican’s font so powerful.
“Using technology as a form of commentary against a political regime that decided to weaponize Times New Roman as a form of culture shaping is sharp for a designer,” he said. “I love how direct and comical it is.”
The font is free, “just like America used to be,” Haddican‘s website says. She said Monday that it has been downloaded about 600 times so far. She describes it as a “social commentary meant to autocorrect the autocrats.”
The hope is that some users might secretly install the font onto the computers of “an ICE apologist,” or “morally bankrupt American” as a way of unleashing mischief.
To the untrained eye, the typeface looks like Times New Roman in the font menu — there’s just a sneaky extra space between the words Times and New. But it’s likely many downloads are by like-minded supporters who want to enjoy the font for themselves.
The technology behind the font is simple.
Haddican modified an existing open-source typeface that resembles Times New Roman and programmed the substitutions. She said the hardest part was deciding which autocorrections to make.
“I know I’ve done an imperfect job. The corrections are a mixture of serious stuff (for example, the word ‘good’ autocorrects to ‘Renee Good was murdered by ICE’) and things that I find funny, like changing ‘Stephen Miller’ to ‘Nosferatu,’” she said.
“The first draft was significantly more profane, but I toned it down. I wanted to offend people by speaking truth to power, not for swearing like a sailor.”
Spencer said the font uses something in the typography world called ligatures, which replaces a set of recognized characters with a single character phrase. An example of this is when you type a fraction or date in a document and it’s automatically formatted.
Haddican joins a group of other typography artists who have made jokes, social commentary, or both through text.
Times Newer Roman is a typeface created by the Brooklyn-based art collective MSCHF (pronounced mischief) in 2018 that looks identical to Times New Roman, except each character is 5% to 10% longer, making essays appear slightly longer without changing formatting rules.
It was billed as a font that could help students cheat on term papers. The font takes jabs at academic productivity culture, using typographic invisibility that’s undetected by the untrained eye.
Sang Mun, a designer and former National Security Agency contractor, created a subversive “surveillance proof” font called ZXX in 2013. The fonts were created to be legible to the human eye, but difficult for surveillance software used by Google and other companies to scan text to read.
More mainstream examples include Shepard Fairey, the artist behind OBEY and President Barack Obama’s iconic HOPE graphic, who is known for his use of single phrases and high-contrast graphics to make political propaganda-style art. In the 2024 presidential election, Fairey made a Kamala Harris poster that said FORWARD in the same style as his Obama art.
On social media, reception for Haddican’s font has been strong, garnering over 6,000 likes on Instagram and hat tips from fellow designers.
“I think just about anything can be a form of resistance, and I believe that humor and playfulness are powerful tools for pushing back against oppression and authoritarianism,” Haddican said. “The trickster (e.g. Bugs Bunny) always beats the martyr (e.g. Elmer Fudd) in the end.”
Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro is racking up contributions from out-of-state billionaires as well as thousands of individual donors across the country.
His likely Republican challenger, State Treasurer Stacy Garrity, meanwhile, is capturing small-donor donations from Pennsylvanians.
That’s according to an analysis of the latest campaign finance filings in the Pennsylvania governor’s contest, as a clearer picture of the race emerges nine months out from Election Day. Shapiro entered 2026 with $30 million on hand — money raised over several years as he has built a national profile — while Garrity raised $1.5 million in her first five months on the campaign trail as she tries to unseat the popular Democratic incumbent. Last year, Shapiro brought in $23.3 million.
Here are three takeaways from the first campaign finance filings in the race, tracking fundraising heading into 2026.
Almost all of Stacy Garrity’s contributors are from Pennsylvania, while 62% of Shapiro’s are in state
Nearly all of Garrity’s individual 1,155 contributors — more than 97% — live in Pennsylvania, and on average gave $889 each.
Shapiro — who has amassed a national following and is a rumored 2028 Democratic presidential contender — had a much further reach and attracted many more donors from around the country. He received contributions from 4,981 individual donors, 62% of whom are from Pennsylvania. The average individual donor to Shapiro contributed $3,461, a number buoyed by multiple six- and seven-figure contributions.
Shapiro received most of his remaining individual donations from California (7.1%), New York (6.3%), New Jersey (2.5%), Florida (2.5%), and Massachusetts (2.4%), according to an Inquirer analysis.
(The analysis includes only donors who contributed more than $50 in 2025. Campaigns are required to list only individual donors who contribute above that threshold.)
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Shapiro’s broad donor base is a result of his status as a popular incumbent governor who is liked among people of both political parties, saidRobin Kolodny, a Temple University political science professor who focuses on campaign finance.
“These amounts that you’re seeing is a very strong signal that ‘This is our guy,’” Kolodny said. “That underscores he is a popular incumbent.”
Kolodny also noted that Shapiro’s state-level fundraising cannot be transferred to a federal political action committee should he decide to run in 2028.But his war chest shows his ability to raise money nationally and his popularity as the leader of the state, she added.
Governor Josh Shapiro during a reelection announcement event at the Alan Horwitz “Sixth Man” Center in Philadelphia on Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026.
Only a small percentage of the population contributes to political campaigns, Kolodny said. And sometimes, it’s the smallest contributions that pay off the most, she said. Small-dollar donations suggest grassroots support that can translate into a person assisting the campaign in additional ways to get out the vote, she said.
Both Shapiro and Garrity have received a significant number of small-dollar donations that illustrate some level of excitement in the race — though Shapiro’s more than 3,000 in-state donors outnumber Garrity’s total by nearly 3-1.
“Think of fundraising as not just a money grab, but also as a campaign strategy,” Kolodny said.
Since announcing his reelection campaign in January, Shapiro has run targeted social media ads and sent fundraising texts, asking for supporters to “chip in” $1 or $5. The strategy worked, bringing in $400,000 in the first two days after his announcement, with an average contribution of $41, according to Shapiro’s campaign. This funding is not reflected in his 2025 campaign finance report.
Most of Shapiro’s money came from out-of-state donors, including billionaire Mike Bloomberg and a George Soros PAC
While Shapiro garnered thousands of individual contributions from Pennsylvania in all 67 counties, according to his campaign, the latest filings show it was the big-money checks from out-of-state billionaires that ran up his total.
Approximately 64% of the $23.3 million Shapiro raised last year came from out-of-state donors.
And more than half — 57% — of Shapiro’s total raised came from six- or seven-figure contributions by powerful PACs or billionaire donors.
By contrast, only 31% of Garrity’s total fundraising came from six-figure contributions.
The biggest single contribution in the governor’s race came from billionaire and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who gave Shapiro $2.5 million last year.
Shapiro also received $1 million from a political action committee led by billionaire Democratic supporter George Soros; and $500,000 from Kathryn and James Murdoch, from the powerful family of media mogul Rupert Murdoch.
Kolodny noted that big contributions from people like Bloomberg are a drop in the bucket of his total political or philanthropic spending.
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“This is not something extraordinary,” Kolodny said. “He’s got nothing but money.”
In Pennsylvania, Shapiro received notably high contributions from Philadelphia Phillies owner John Middleton, who gave $125,000, and Nemacolin Resort owner MaggieHardy, who gave $250,000, among others. He also received a number of five-figure contributions from private equity officials, venture capitalists, and industry executives in life sciences, construction, and more.
Garrity’ssingle biggest donation was $250,000 from University City Housing Co., a real estate firm providing housing near Drexel University and the University of Pennsylvania. Her largest contributions from individuals included $50,000 from her finance chair, Bob Asher of Asher Chocolates, and another $50,000 from Alfred Barbour, a retired executive from Concast Metal Products.
Garrity has served as Pennsylvania’s state treasurer since 2020 and has led the low-profile statewide office with little controversy. She did not join the race for governor until August and raised only a fraction of the funds Shapiro did in that same time. Meanwhile, Shapiro spent 2025 at the political forefront as a moderate Democrat trying to challenge President Donald Trump in a state that helped elect him. Shapiro also benefited from his national name recognition after he was considered for Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate in 2024.
Shapiro has so far outraised Garrity 30-1, and top Pennsylvania Republicans have said they want to see Garrity fundraising more aggressively nationally.
Kolodny said Garrity’s low fundraising is a reflection of the state of the race: Republicans put up a weak candidate in 2022 against Shapiro during his first run for governor, and now many powerful donors want to keep the relationship they have formed with Shapiro over the last three years.
“That will reflect as a lack of enthusiasm for her,” Kolodny said. “Now she could turn that around, but from what I see, I don’t see her that much, only recently. She had the last six months; she could have done a lot more.”
Controversy over donations tied to associates of Jeffrey Epstein
Shapiro’s top contributions from individual donors also included a $500,000 check from Reid Hoffman, the Silicon Valley-based billionaire cofounder of LinkedIn. His name showed up thousands of times in the trove of documents recently released by the U.S. Department of Justice related to the investigation into financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Garrity has highlighted the donations Shapiro received from Hoffman, and has publicly called on Shapiro to return the tech billionaire’s campaign contributions from last year and prior years, totaling more than $2 million since 2021.
Hoffman has claimed he had only a fundraising relationship with Epstein, but publiclyadmitted he had visited his island. He has not been charged with wrongdoing.
A spokesperson for Shapiro said Garrity should “stop playing politics with the Epstein files.”
“Donald Trump is mentioned in the files over 5,000 times. Is she going to ask him to rescind his endorsement?” asked Manuel Bonder, Shapiro’s spokesperson.
Garrity has previously downplayed Trump’s appearance in the Epstein files, and argued that Democrats would have released them much sooner if there was clear evidence of Trump partaking in any inappropriate behavior.
GOP candidate for Pennsylania Governor, Stacy Garrity and Jason Richey hold up their arms in Harrisburg, Pa., Saturday, February 7, 2026. The PA State Republican Committee endorsed the two in their quest for the governor’s mansion. (For the Inquirer/Kalim A. Bhatti)
If Shapiro were to return the funds from Hoffman, it would be bad for Garrity, Kolodny said, because she has made very few other political attacks against him.
The embattled new boss of CBS News, the until-now opinion journalist Bari Weiss, on Tuesday led a town hall-style meeting for editors and reportersat the storied TV network and appeared to understand both the crisis of American media and the values needed to fix it.
“Our strategy until now has been: Cling to the audience that remains on broadcast television,” Weiss told her newsroom. “I’m here to tell you that if we stick to that strategy, we’re toast.” She called for more investigative reporting and pledged to merge the values of a high-tech start-up with “journalistic principles that will never change — seeking the truth, serving the public, and ferociously guarding our independence …”
Meanwhile, the overpowering stench of burning toast filled the room.
That’s because Weiss and her billionaire pro-Trump overlords, the Ellison family, seem to be doing all the wrong things, undercutting those pretty words. Her first concrete move announced in tandem with the town hall was the hiring of 18 thumb-sucking opinion journalists — a ragtag, right-leaning group that includes a medical huckster and an ex-Trump official — even as the newsroom braced for buyouts and feared layoffs that would slash honest shoe-leather reporting.
The move toward more commentators telling you what to think about an America spiraling into chaos and fewer boots-on-the-ground journalists digging up what’s needed to fix that crisis — objective truth — could not happen at a worse time, and unfortunately, this is not unique to CBS News.
As the Washington Post braces for a round of layoffs, staffers bemoan the lack of vision from owner Jeff Bezos and CEO Will Lewis. https://t.co/92VsAGFbaK
The Washington Post — which has lost hundreds of thousands of digital subscribers since a self-coup by its billionaire owner, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, shifted its opinion section to the political right — is also bracing for deep staff cuts that would cripple its international reporting, as well as its sports staff.
The extent of the widely rumored staff reductions isn’t yet known, but a preview came last week when the paper briefly told the newsroom it was axing its long-standing plan to send 12 journalists to next month’s Winter Olympics in Italy, before slightly backtracking and saying four reporters would still go.
Still, that move, and the louder rumors about pending layoffs, has led to deep concern over the future of its metro Washington and international desks. “We urge you to consider how the proposed layoffs will certainly lead us first to irrelevance — not the shared success that remains attainable,” stated a letter from 60 journalists on the foreign desk sent this week to Bezos.
“It’s all very confusing, and no one knows anything,” an anonymous Post staffer told the Guardian. “The anxiety is so sad.”
America has been losing news reporters for years. Nationally, newsroom staff have plummeted a whopping 26% since 2008, and the pace of job cuts has only accelerated in recent years as vast news deserts with no sources of local journalism expand across rural America. It’s been a perfect storm prompted heavily by internet-driven changes in reader or viewer habits, as well as declining public trust in traditional media.
But the looming cuts at the Post and CBS are especially painful both in a symbolic sense and also as self-inflicted own goals that will only heighten public mistrust instead of attacking the problem.
In 1972, with then-President Richard Nixon driving toward a landslide reelection, the Post, under its legendary editor Ben Bradlee, and CBS, with its popular, avuncular anchor Walter Cronkite, were the only two major outlets that took seriously the links between the Watergate break-in and the Nixon White House. Both newsrooms threw major resources into keeping alivethe story that eventually caused Nixon to resign, including a 22-minute special report that Cronkite anchored on the CBS Evening News.
In this undated photo released by Paramount, one of the Free Press’s cofounders, Bari Weiss, poses for a portrait. Weiss is the editor-in-chief of CBS News.
That kind of accountability journalism created a bond with the audience that should have left CBS and the Post better positioned to weather the economic storms that have battered journalism in the 21st century. The current crises were self-inflicted, albeit for slightly different reasons.
In Washington, the Post zigzagged from acknowledging what its readers wanted during Donald Trump’s first term — both in its “Democracy Dies in Darkness” slogan to some solid journalism that backed that up — to billionaire Bezos’ embrace of authoritarianism ahead of Trump’s second coming. The Bezos-ordered spiking of a Kamala Harris endorsement and a rightward editorial shift accelerated a steep decline in subscriptions, including about 300,000 lost readers after the nonendorsement.
One could argue that staff cuts in such an environment are inevitable, but one might also question the priorities of the Post’s owner, the world’s second-richest person. Amazon — where Bezos remains executive chairman — has just spent $75 million on a White House-fluffing Melania documentary expected to bring back just $1 million at the box office.
The priorities at Weiss-run CBS News seem similarly warped. The money the newsroom is spending on those 18 or so opinion journalists — a motley crew that includes Mark Hyman, who health experts have accused of “quackery,” calling him a “germ theory denialist,” and retired Gen. H.R. McMaster, a key policy adviser in Trump’s first term — could have been spent on new investigative reporters.
But then Weiss’ overlords in the Ellison family, whose recent role in the TikTok takeover and current fight to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery both depend on the blessing of the Trump White House, probably don’t want the stories Leonnig is uncovering.
Tense afternoon in Kenner, outside of New Orleans, as protesters followed Greg Bovino and Border Patrol around a neighborhood around 3pm today. pic.twitter.com/4IcH4OfL2K
This is not a diatribe against all opinion journalism. I am an opinion journalist, and I started moving in that direction in the 2000s when I thought someone needed to be screaming from the rooftops about the lying and the war crimes of the George W. Bush regime. I think commentary and debate are especially needed in the local communities where such jobs have vanished the most, but I also think powerful opinion journalism exists mainly to augment on-the-ground reporting, not replace it.
The greatest irony of the pullbacks at CBS and the Post is that the national crisis over immigration raids in Minnesota and the conduct of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers who’ve killed two citizens has shown that what American democracy needs most is seekers of the truth — much more than people telling you what to think.
The over-the-top lies from the highest levels of the U.S. government about how and why Renee Good and Alex Pretti were gunned down on the streets of Minneapolis have fallen apart because multiple videos have allowed citizens to see the truth of what actually happened.
Most of those videos were shot by citizen observers, but with 3,000 federal agents fanning out across Minnesota and hundreds more conducting immigration raids from Maine to Los Angeles, a web of local and independent journalists has also proved critical in documenting the raids and their many human rights abuses.
Dozens of journalists have been tear-gassed multiple times or struck with rubber bullets or pepper balls, and yet continue to cover protests and ICE activities, often in the most miserable conditions, and keep going out there to create a public record.
CBS News and the Washington Post could have been at the vanguard of this movement, which would have been a fitting tribute to the legacies of Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow, Bradlee and Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, and their many intrepid colleagues. Instead, the supposed keepers of those flames have made a horrible, doomed bet on autocracy.
What I’ve watched in recent weeks coming out of Minneapolis and elsewhere on the front lines of the war for America’s soul has given me more hope for the future of journalism than any time since the ball dropped to launch this cursed millennium. That CBS and the Post chose this exact moment to willingly blind themselves is beyond pathetic.
On Jan. 8, Andre Golsorkhi, founder and CEO of design firm Haldon House, presented plans for a revitalized town center, complete with historic architecture, green spaces, and businesses that “fit the character” of the area. Golsorkhi told a packed school auditorium that Haldon House plans to bring in boutique shops, open an upscale-yet-approachable restaurant, and create spaces for communal gathering.
At the meeting, Golsorkhi also revealed that the project was backed by Jeff Yass, Pennsylvania’s richest man, and his wife, Janine. Golsorkhi said the Yasses want to revitalize Gladwyne as part of a local “community impact project.” Haldon House and the Yasses, who live near Gladwyne, have spent over $15 million acquiring multiple properties at the intersection of Youngs Ford and Righters Mill Roads.
Renderings of a proposed revitalization project in Gladwyne, Pa. Design firm Haldon House is working with billionaire Jeff Yass to redevelop the Main Line village while preserving its historic architecture, developers told Gladwyne residents at a Jan. 8 meeting.
What is, and isn’t, allowable?
For some residents, one question has lingered: Is one family allowed to redevelop an entire village?
A petition calling on Lower Merion Township to hold a public hearing and pass protections preventing private owners from consolidating control of town centers had gathered nearly four dozen signatures as of Friday.
Around 4,100 people live in the 19035 zip code, which encompasses much of Gladwyne, according to data from the 2020 U.S. Census.
“Residents deserve a say before their town is transformed.No one family, no matter how wealthy, should unilaterally control the civic and commercial core of a historic Pennsylvania community,” the petition reads.
Yet much of Haldon House’s plan is allowable under township zoning code, said Chris Leswing, Lower Merion’s director for building and planning.
Plans to refurbish buildings, clean up landscaping, and bring in new businesses are generally permitted by right, meaning the developers will not need approval from the township to move forward. Gladwyne’s downtown is zoned as “neighborhood center,” a zoning designation put on the books in 2023 that allows for small-scale commercial buildings and local retail and services. The zoning code, which is currently in use in Gladwyne and Penn Wynne, ensures commercial buildings can be no taller than two stories.
The developers’ plans to open a new restaurant in the former Gladwyne Market and renovate buildings with a late-1800s aesthetic, including wraparound porches and greenery, are generally within the bounds of what is allowed, once they obtain a building permit.
The Village Shoppes, including the Gladwyne Pharmacy, at the intersection of Youngs Ford and Righters Mill Roads in Gladwyne on Friday, Jan. 9, 2026.
More ambitious plans, however, like converting a residential home into a parking lot or burying the power lines that hang over the village, would require extra levels of approval, Leswing said.
The developers hope to convert a residential property on the 900 block of Youngs Ford Road into a parking lot. Lower Merion generally encourages parking lots to be tucked behind buildings and does not allow street-facing parking, a measure designed to avoid a strip mall feel, Leswing said. In order to turn the lot into parking, the developers would need an amendment to the zoning code, which would have to be approved by the board of commissioners.
Various approvals would also be needed to put Gladwyne’s power lines underground, an ambitious goal set by the Haldon House and Yass team.
Leswing clarified that no official plans have been submitted, making it hard to say how long the process will take. It will be a matter of months, at least, before the ball really gets rolling.
Leswing added the developers have been “so good about being locked into the community” and open to constructive feedback.
Golsorkhi said it will be some time before his team can provide a meaningful update on the development, but expressed gratitude to the hundreds of residents who have reached out with questions, support, and concerns.
Map of properties in Gladwyne bought or leased by the Yass family.
From ‘110% in favor’ to ‘a tough pill to swallow’
Fred Abrams, 65, a real estate developer who has lived in Gladwyne for seven years, said he and his wife are “110% in favor” of the redevelopment, calling it an “absolute no-brainer.”
Many Gladwyne residents live in single-family homes that keep them in their own, sometimes isolating, worlds, his wife, Kassie Monaghan Abrams, 57, said.
“Here’s an opportunity for being outside and meeting your neighbors and, to me, getting back to spending time with people,” she said of the proposal to create communal gathering areas.
“I think it’s a very thoughtful, beautiful design,” Monaghan Abrams added.
Some social media commenters called the proposal “charming” and “a fantastic revitalization.”
Others were more skeptical.
Ryan Werner, 40, moved to Gladwyne in 2012 with his wife, who grew up in the town.
“One of the things I’ve kind of fallen in love with about Gladwyne is the sense of community,” said Werner, who has a background in e-commerce sales and is transitioning to work in the mental health space.
“I’m less opposed to just the commercial side of it and more grossed out by the involvement of certain people in it,” Werner said.
Gladwyne is a Democratic-leaning community that voted overwhelmingly for former Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 election.
On social media, some griped about the changes.
“The Village will be just like Ardmore and Bryn Mawr. Can’t undo it once they build it,” one commenter wrote in a Gladwyne Facebook group.
Golsorkhi said in an email that the “enthusiasm, excitement and support” from the community have been “overwhelming.”
This suburban content is produced with support from the Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation and The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Editorial content is created independently of the project donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com/donate. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org/supporters.
It was the start of a voicemail from the president to Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, received one week after a man firebombed the governor’s residence in Harrisburg in an attempt to kill Shapiro while his family slept inside on the first night of Passover.
Shapiro hadn’t recognized the number Trump was calling from, and at first didn’t answer.
When Shapiro called back, Trump offered well wishes to the governor’s family, his usual braggadocio, and some advice: he shouldn’t want to be president, Shapiro recalls in his new memoir, set to be released later this month.
The book, Where We Keep the Light, which comes out on Jan. 27, has attracted a flood of attention as it signals Shapiro’s potential presidential aspirations and also serves as a retort to the unflattering portrayal of the governor in former Vice President Kamala Harris’ recent memoir.
In the 257-page book, Shapiro details his early life in Montgomery County, his two decades in elected office, his connection to his faith, and his pragmatic leadership approach.
And for the political observers who have watched Shapiro’s rise: He delves into his brief consideration of whether he should run for president after Joe Biden dropped out of the race in 2024, the whirlwind experience of being vetted to be Harris’ running mate, and the unfair scrutiny he felt he faced during that process.
Here are six takeaways from Shapiro’s forthcoming memoir, obtained by The Inquirer.
Trump to Shapiro: ‘He cautioned that I shouldn’t want to be president’
When Shapiro, 52, returned Trump’s call in April 2025, he received the president’s support and some unprompted compliments from Trump, he writes.
“[Trump] said he liked the way I talked to people and approached problems,” Shapiro retells, as Trump went through the list of potential 2028 Democratic Party presidential candidates. “He cautioned that I shouldn’t want to be president, given how dangerous it had become to hold the office now.”
Gov. Josh Shapiro speaks during a news conference, in Butler, Pa., Sunday, July 14, 2024, following an assassination attempt on President Donald Trump.
(It is unclear whether Shapiro tried to call Trump after he experienced his own assassination attempt in Butler, Pa., the previous summer, though Shapiro publicly vehemently denounced the violence.)
Shapiro sells himself as a pragmatist and writes proudly of the times in which he has disagreed with his party or changed his positions.
For example, he recalls being asked by Harris’ vetting team about his past comments criticizing Democrats in federal, state, and local offices for how they handled COVID-19 closures. He stood by his criticism of former Gov. Tom Wolf at the time over business and school closures, and of the mask and vaccine mandates implemented by the Biden administration, he writes.
“I respectfully pushed back, asking if they believed that we had gotten everything right, to which they generally agreed that we had not,” Shapiro writes about his conversation with Harris’ vetting team. “I just had been willing to say the quiet part out loud, even if it wasn’t easy or popular or toeing the line to do so.”
Then-Attorney General Josh Shapiro and Then-Gov. Tom Wolf both go in for handshakes before the start of a press conference on the harmful effects of anti-abortion policies at 5th and Market in Philadelphia on Thursday, Dec. 9, 2021.
He also writes about his journey to change his position on the death penalty over the years. In the days after the Tree of Life synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh, in which 11 Jewish people were killed while worshipping, he had initially supported the death penalty for the suspect. Since then, his views have evolved and he no longer supports capital punishment and called on the legislature to end the practice.
Lori Shapiro is behind most of her husband’s good ideas
Lori Shapiro, 53, mostly avoids her husband’s frequent appearances in the limelight.
But in his book, Shapiro writes that his wife has challenged him as she has supported his political rise, pushing him to question what he really wants, do the right thing, or even help him shape his messaging to voters. She discouraged him from running for U.S. Senate in 2016 after top Democrats approached him, which led him to run for attorney general instead. She was also his first call when Biden dropped out and he briefly considered whether he should run for president, and his voice of reason during the veepstakes.
Josh Shapiro and his wife Lori leave the state Capitol in Harrisburg Tuesday, Jan. 17 2023, on his way to the stage to be sworn in as the 48th Governor of Pennsylvania.
The couple started dating in high school, before breaking up during college when they went to different universities in New York — he attended the University of Rochester, while she went to Colgate University. Shapiro writes that he quickly realized he missed her, and wrote her a letter in an effort to win her back.
“So I cracked my knuckles, and wrote my heart out. I was Shakespeare composing a sonnet. I was Taylor Swift before Taylor Swift. I was Lloyd Dobler in Say Anything, in a trench coat with the boom box over my head,” Shapiro writes. “I was getting the girl back.”
This earned Shapiro the title of “Mr. Lori” from her hall mates at Colgate. He did not win her back until years later, when the two reconnected in Washington after college, and quickly became engaged. The twomarried and had four children together, who each make frequent appearances throughout the book.
Surrounded by his four children, Gov. Josh Shapiro kisses his wife Lori after his is sworn in as the 48th Governor of Pennsylvania during inauguration ceremonies at the state Capitol in Harrisburg Tuesday, Jan. 17 2023.
Shapiro grapples with an early career move that kicked off his reputation as disloyal
Shapiro is not without regret for how some of his career moves and ambitions affected the people who helped him get where he is today, he writes.
Shapiro got his start in politics on the Hill under then-U.S. Rep. Joe Hoeffel, a Montgomery County Democrat. He quickly worked his way up to be Hoeffel’s chief of staff before returning to Abington Township to run for state representative.
But when Shapiro was done with frequent trips to Harrisburg and ready for his next rung on the ladder, Hoeffel was in the way. Shapiro had a plan to run for county commissioner and flip the board for the first time in more than 150 years — making Montco the first Philadelphia collar county to swing into Democratic control. Now all of the Philly suburban counties are controlled by Democrats, and Shapiro is credited for starting the trend. But Hoeffel was not a part of that calculation.
Shapiro writes that Hoeffel was “struggling politically.” He says he told him he would not run against him, but he also would not run with him.
“I knew that I couldn’t win with him, and I knew that it wasn’t the right thing for the party or the county, even if we could somehow eke out the victory,” Shapiro writes.
Hoeffel eventually decided not to run, and was quoted in The Inquirer in 2017 as saying that loyalty is not Shapiro’s “strong suit,” comments he has since stood by, in addition to praising Shapiro for his successes ever since.
“I’d hear about [Hoeffel] talking to the press or to people behind my back about how he thought I lacked loyalty, that I was someone who needed to be watched,” Shapiro writes. “It felt terrible, and of course, I never intended to hurt him in any way and I would never have run against him. I wanted the Democrats to have a shot, and I knew that I could get it done.”
Shapiro initially said antisemitism didn’t play into Kamala Harris’ running mate decision. Now he has more to say
In the days after Harris passed over Shapiro to be her running mate in favor of Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Shapiro said “antisemitism had no impact” on her decision.
Now, Shapiro questions whether he was unfairly scrutinized by Harris’ vetting team as the only Jewish person being considered as a finalist, including a moment when a top member of Harris’ camp asked him if he had “ever been an agent of the Israeli government.”
“I wondered whether these questions were being posed to just me — the only Jewish guy in the running — or if everyone who had not held a federal office was being grilled about Israel in the same way,” he writes.
Vice President Kamala Harris visits Little Thai Market at Reading Terminal Market with Gov. Josh Shapiro after she spoke at the APIA Vote Presidential Town Hall at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia, Pa., on Saturday, July 13, 2024. The photo was taken eight days before President Joe Biden’s decision to exit the race.
He details his broader concerns with how he was treated during the process, including some perceived insults about his family’s lack of wealth or Lori Shapiro’s appearance.
Since Shapiro’s book was leaked to the media over the weekend, sources close to Walz confirmed to ABC News that the Minnesota governor was also asked whether he was an agent of a foreign government, due to his multiple trips to China.
Shapiro, for his part, has written about his time in Israel, including a high school program in which he completed service projects on a farm, on a fishery at a kibbutz, and at an Israeli army base. He once described himself in his college student newspaper as a “past volunteer in the Israeli army” — a characterization that circulated widely after it was reported by The Inquirer during the veepstakes.
Vereb had been along for the ride for Shapiro’s time in the state House as a fellow state representative from Montgomery County (though he was a Republican), as a top liaison to him in the attorney general’s office, and eventually a member of his cabinet in the governor’s office until his resignation in 2023.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro questioned whether he was being unfairly scrutinized asthe only Jewish person being considered as a finalistto be Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate — and briefly entertained his own run for the presidency — according to a copy of his upcoming book obtained by The Inquirer.
Shapiro, a popular Democratic governor long rumored to have future presidential ambitions, even briefly entertained a run shortly after then-President Joe Biden unexpectedly dropped out of the race in July 2024, according to his book. The Abington Township resident is now seen as a top contender for the 2028 Democratic nomination as he seeks reelection in Pennsylvania this year.
But before Shapiro ended up in the veepstakes for Harris’ running mate, he wrote in his book that there was a moment right after Biden dropped out of the race where he considered whether he should run for president.
“Well, now what?” Shapiro wrote. “Maybe there would be a process the party would engage in to replace him? Did I want to be part of that?”
He called his wife, Lori, who at the time was out of the country with their two younger kids. “I don’t think we are ready to do this,” Shapiro recalled his wife saying from a Walmart in Vancouver. “It’s not the right time for our family. And it’s not on our terms.”
After that call, Shapiro wrote that he quickly decided he didn’t want to run and would back Harris, as Biden also endorsed her for the top of the ticket.
Once the field cleared for Harris, Shapiro recalled seeing his face on TV as her potential running mate, before he was asked by her campaign manager to be formally vetted.
In the days that followed,Shapiro contended with increasing national scrutiny as he emerged as a front-runner. Some pro-Palestinian protesters began calling Shapiro “Genocide Josh” online, he wrote. And top Democrats questioned whether a Jewish running mate would deter voters from supporting Harris, as Shapiro had been outspoken against some pro-Palestinian campus protests that year.
What was unknown: Whether those same questions — and some even more extreme — were circulating within Harris’ camp, Shapiro wrote in his most detailed retelling of his experience vying for the vice presidency to date.
Gov. Josh Shapiro at a rally for Vice President Kamala Harris at Wissahickon High School in Ambler on July 29, 2024.
Just before he went to meet with Harris at the vice president’s residence in the summer of 2024, Shapiro received a call from Dana Remus, former White House counsel for Biden who was coleading the vetting process for Harris.
“Have you ever been an agent of the Israeli government?” Remus asked, according to Shapiro’s memoir.
“Had I been a double agent for Israel? Was she kidding?” Shapiro wrote in his 257-page book. “I told her how offensive the question was.”
According to the memoir, Remus then asked if Shapiro had ever communicated with an undercover Israeli agent, which he shot back: “If they were undercover… how the hell would I know?”
“Remus was just doing her job. I get it. But the fact that she asked, or was told to ask that question by someone else, said a lot about some of the people around the VP,” Shapiro wrote.
In high school, Shapiro completed a program in Israel that included service projects on a farm, and at a fishery in a kibbutz, as well as at an Israeli army base, which he once described in his college student newspaper as “a past volunteer in the Israeli army.”
Harris’ office could not be reached for comment Sunday evening. Remus also could not immediately be reached for comment Sunday.
Shapiro, more broadly, recalled getting the feeling from Harris’ vetting team that she should pick Shapiro — a popular Democratic governor in a critical swing state — but that they had reservations about whether Shapiro’s views would mesh with Harris’.
In one vetting session with U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D., Nev.), former Labor Secretary Marty Walsh, former associate Attorney General Tony West, and former senior Biden adviser Cedric Richmond, Shapiro wrote that he had been questioned “a lot” about Israel, including why he had been outspoken against the protests at Penn.
“I wondered whether these questions were being posed to just me — the only Jewish guy in the running — or if everyone who had not held a federal office was being grilled about Israel in the same way,” he wrote. (Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, who is Jewish, was also vetted to be Harris’ running mate. Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff, is also Jewish.)
In his book, Shapiro recalled the whirlwind two weeks as an awe-inspiring window into an opportunity — but ultimately it was one he knew he didn’t want.
When Shapiro finally sat down with Harris in the dining room at the Naval Observatory, he said it became clear that she had a different vision for the vice presidency than what he wanted. He would work primarily with her staff and couldn’t say whether he would have access to her. In her own experience as vice president, she saw the job as mostly to make sure that you aren’t making any problems for the president, he wrote.
Shapiro noted his own relationship with his No. 2, Lt. Gov. Austin Davis. The role in itself has few powers, but Shapiro views Davis as a governing partner and is one of few people who can walk into his office unannounced at any time, he wrote. He wanted the same relationship with Harris, he said, noting that he knew he would not be the decision-maker.
“If we had door A and door B as options, and she was for door A and I was for door B, I just wanted to makes sure that I could make the case for door B,” Shapiro wrote.
But Harris was “crystal clear” that that wasn’t the kind of president-vice president dynamic she envisioned, he said.
In her own book released last year, 107 Days, Harris recalled the meeting differently. There, she wrote that Shapiro had “peppered” her with questions and “mused that he would want to be in the room for every decision.”His ambitions, she said, didn’t align with her view that a vice president should be a No. 2 and not a “copresident.”
Former Vice President Kamala Harris speaks with Dawn Staley (left), while promoting her new book “107 Days,” at the Met on Sept. 25 in Philadelphia. The event was held in partnership with Uncle Bobbie’s Coffee & Books.
As Shapiro tells it, the friction with Harris’ team didn’t stop there.
Shortly after meeting with Harris, Shapiro in his book recalled another unpleasant conversation with Remus, in which he wrote that she said she “could sense that I didn’t want to do this.”
According to the book, Remus said it would be hard for Shapiro to move to Washington, it would be a strain financially for his family who “didn’t have a lot of money” by D.C. standards, and that Lori would need to get a whole new wardrobe and pay people to do her hair and makeup.
It was then that he decided to leave the apartment where he had been asked to wait until Harris could come and talk to him again, he recalled.
“These comments were unkind to me. They were nasty to Lori,” Shapiro wrote. “I hold no grudge against Remus, who I know was doing the job she had to do, but I needed to leave.”
Shapiro went home, he said, and went over the day’s events with Lori at the edge of their bed.
“On one hand, I was still tugged by the prestige of it all. It’s an honor. It’s a big title. But that’s never been enough for me,” he wrote. Still, he struggled with what it would mean to withdraw, concerned about not playing his part in a high-stakes election and letting his supporters down. Ultimately, he decided that it was not his race to win or lose, he wrote.
“People were going to cast their votes for her, or they weren’t,” he added.
Vice President Kamala Harris, Democratic nominee for president, and her running mate Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, address a rally to kick off their campaign at the Liacouras Center in Philadelphia, Pa., on Tuesday, August 6, 2024.
He decided that day he did not want the job, and toyed with the idea about publicly releasing a statement withdrawing himself from the running. He said he also tried to tell Harris he did not think it would be a good fit, but wasn’t able to reach her.
“I was wrung out. I just wanted to be home with my family, to take a walk with Lori, and just be,” he wrote.
Gov. Josh Shapiro takes the stage ahead of Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz at a rally in Philadelphia’s Liacouras Center on August 6, 2024.
But when it was time for him to take the stage ahead of Walz and Harris, he was long-applauded by his home city and gave a speech “from my heart” about how he took pride in his faith and his support for Walz and Harris.
Shapiro’s memoir will be released Jan. 27 and is a reflection on his decades as an elected official, including as Pennsylvania attorney general, as well as the firebombing of his home last year. He will tout the book in Philadelphia on Saturday at 3 p.m. at Parkway Central Library. He will also discuss the book at upcoming book tour stops in New York and Washington.
