📖 Today’s #PoliticsPA Guide. Shapiro writes that Harris’ team asked if he had ever been an Israeli agent. How McCormick survived a crazy first year. Trump has advocated lowering food costs. A year later, is PA feeling relieved? Hey NFL: What’s the catch?
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The most vital story
1. Shapiro writes that Harris’ team asked if he had ever been an Israeli agent
“Governor Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania, a prominent Democrat who was the leading candidate for the position Vice President Kamala Harris The 2024 vice presidential nominee has provided his most detailed account yet of the vice presidential search process in his recent memoir obtained by The New York Times.
In low: it suggests that he was much uglier than is generally believed.
In Mr. Shapiro’s book “Where We Keep the Light,” the governor is assessed by describing his interactions with Ms. Harris herself. But Mr. Shapiro, who is Jewish, details a controversial vetting process in which Ms. Harris’s team focused intensely on his views on Israel – so much so that at one point, he wrote, he was asked if he had ever been an agent of the Israeli government. | New York Times
Elsewhere
Trump told Josh Shapiro he shouldn’t run for president and 5 more takeaways from Shapiro’s upcoming book. “Hey Josh, this is Donald Trump.” This is the beginning of a presidential voicemail that Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro received a week after a man firebombed the Governor’s Mansion in Harrisburg in an attempt to kill Shapiro while his family slept inside on the first night of Passover.’ | Questioner from Philadelphia
When asked about the anti-ICE protests, McCormick claims that “dehumanizing language” leads to violence. “It’s a slippery slope,” the Republican senator from Pennsylvania said on CBS in an interview with his Democratic counterpart, Senator John Fetterman. | Questioner from Philadelphia
Lawmakers focus on NCAA instead of NIL and revenue sharing. “Attempts to rein in the big business of college sports are gaining traction on Capitol Hill, where a growing number of lawmakers in both parties are outraged by the NCAA and signaling that congressional intervention on athlete pay and revenue sharing is inevitable.” | Hill
Country
2. How Sen. Dave McCormick survived a crazy first year as Pennsylvania’s purple Republican
“One year after arriving at the Capitol US Senator Dave McCormick he leaned forward in his radiant seventh-floor office and said he was well aware that not everyone wanted him here.
“Do the math,” he said, pointing out that in a state of 13.5 million people, “7.1 million voted. 3.5 million voted for me. So there are a lot of people who either don’t know me or may not agree with me, and even people who voted for me may not agree with me.”
It was a careful balancing act — broadly defining the former hedge fund CEO’s first year in office at a time of significant political upheaval, when Republicans control all the levers of the federal government and face a daily barrage of questions about Trump’s violations of historical norms.’ | Pittsburgh Postal Newspaper
Elsewhere
Garrity’s attacks on political ambition are hypocritical, Democrats say. “It’s one of Pennsylvania Treasurer Stacy Garrity’s most frequent criticisms of Gov. Josh Shapiro: If given a second term, he will spend most of that term campaigning for president of the United States. But,” critics note, “that’s exactly what Garrity is doing now that he’s running for governor in his second term.” | THAT’S ALL
PA-03: Rabb is trying to be a standard-bearer for the left by running for Congress in Pennsylvania. Will progressives rally around him? “In Philadelphia’s most-watched congressional race in over a decade, state Republican Chris Rabb portrayed himself as a shameless anti-establishment leftist. He refuses corporate donations, calls the war in Gaza a genocide and wants to abolish U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.” | Questioner from Philadelphia
PA-03: Street could become PA’s first Muslim member of Congress. But don’t make assumptions about his politics. “Street holds relatively moderate views on the Gaza conflict and, if elected, would likely stand out among his Muslim colleagues in Congress.” | Questioner from Philadelphia
AP GOP leader overturns Washington County Republican Party’s vote of no confidence against state senator Bartolotta. “Dispute within the Republican Party over the activities of State Senator Camera Bartolotta became public after the Washington County Republican Party Executive Committee voted 21-3 to invalidate a vote of no confidence in the senator by State Party Chairman Greg Rothman.” | Pittsburgh Postal Newspaper
Around the Republic of Poland
3. Trump advocated lowering food costs. A year later, is PA feeling relieved?
“Affordability was a top priority for voters in the 2024 presidential election: In one survey, more than 95% of respondents said rising gas and food prices helped shape their voting decisions. President Donald Trump he was racking up his grocery bills throughout his campaign against then-…Vice President Kamala Harrislamenting the cost of everyday items like eggs and milk.
But as Trump ends one year in office, economic indicators show that grocery costs remain high. There has been a decline in the prices of some products, in particular eggs, as the worst effects of bird flu have subsided. But beef and coffee prices rose, and overall food prices were 3.1% higher in December than a year earlier, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. | Erie Times-News
Elsewhere
State officials could appoint a recent Allegheny County controller to replace O’Connor. Do they? “Even as Corey O’Connor took office as Pittsburgh’s newest mayor, his old job as national controller in Allegheny also changed, with then-deputy controller Amy Weise Clements taking his place. Maybe she wanted to get comfortable. ” | THAT’S ALL
PA public universities did not receive an escalate in state funding this year and are preparing for a hard enrollment outlook. “The system is in a state of readjustment having lost approximately one-third of its student body since 2010, which includes the merger of six universities into two entities. The universities in the system are: Cheyney, Commonwealth, East Stroudsburg, Indiana, Kutztown, Millersville, Penn West, Shippensburg, Slippery Rock and West Chester. ” | Questioner from Philadelphia
Pennsylvania’s Green Party elects Lancaster member to state leadership. “Tony Dastra, who ran unsuccessfully for mayor and Lancaster City Council last year, was elected by Green Party delegates to serve as lead commissioner.” | LNP
Editorial
4. What do you think about it?
1 item
5. The NFL once again faces questions about the definition of a catch
“Hey NFL: What’s the catch?
Once again, many football fans, coaches and commentators are questioning the definition of a catch after a disputed interception helped eliminate the Buffalo Bills from the playoffs following Saturday’s 33-30 loss to the Denver Broncos.
By definition, capture seems to have been the right solution. A lot of people don’t agree with that.” | AP
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