Does Shapiro Have What It Takes?

Josh Shapiro has a theory of politics. Pennsylvania’s Democratic Governor thinks “politics [is] about getting stuff done and improving people’s lives [by offering] tangible solutions to real problems.” Earlier this week, he came to Erie to promote his new primer on political philosophy, Where We Keep the Light: Stories from a Life of Service.

Shapiro’s recent book release is just the latest step toward his national ambitions. And here in Erie County, it seems voters are enthusiastic about Shapiro’s likely quest. The governor spoke to a packed house at Erie’s Jefferson Educational Society (JES). Ben Speggen, vice president of JES, has arranged visits by the likes of Barack Obama, Mike Pence, and Neil deGrasse Tyson. As he told me, “I cannot think of [a] time, when we reached capacity quicker than we did with the upcoming event with Governor Shapiro.”

As governor, Shapiro has built a center-left profile on a motto of “Getting Sh*t Done.” Fate handed Shapiro the chance to prove it. In June 2023, a Philadelphia-area I-95 overpass collapsed. A central cog in the entire I-95 corridor, the crumpled bridge threatened to gridlock the entire Northeast. Observers predicted construction would take months. A disaster declaration enabled the governor to cut the red tape and build a temporary bridge. Workers labored around-the-clock; when rain slowed progress, a NASCAR jet dryer enabled labor to resume. The public was transfixed. Philadelphia bars livestreamed construction and offered 95-cent wing-and beer-specials. 12 days after its collapse, the I-95 overpass was opened for traffic. In a state where Democrats and Republicans are separated by .01%, 74% of Pennsylvanians approved of Shapiro’s performance.

Gil Troy understands the I-95 “miracle.” The McGill University presidential historian told me, “Americans are fed up with sclerosis and fed up with a government that doesn’t get anything done and fed with politicians who are much better at bloviating than building.” Building on his popularity, Shapiro was at one point on Kamala Harris’s vice-presidential short list. Now, Shapiro is a likely Democratic contender in the 2028 presidential primary. Still, though, only 40% of Pennsylvanians deem their boy wonder solid presidential timber. A recent national poll of Democratic contenders had Shapiro in third-place at 10%.

Shapiro exudes “moderation” but Democrats, in Troy’s estimation, are in no mood for equanimity. Trump, he told me, has Democrats “in a kind of macho competition of who can be the most aggressive in denouncing Trump.” Forgetting that national elections are won in the swing states with moderate and independent voters, Democrats want confrontation. As Troy views it, “Donald Trump loves those moments, and he lives for these kinds of confrontations, because that’s where he can out-Trump anybody and he wins. Where he’s less effective is when the argument is a thoughtful argument about affordability or decency.” In other words, a thoughtful moderate may be the antidote to Trumpism, but “moderate” is not on everyone’s political menu.

Geoffrey Kabaservice knows a thing or two about the moderate political tradition. The author of books about moderate Republicanism is also vice president of the centrist Niskanen Center. He told me, “The term moderate itself is identified with the status quo, which is not a popular thing these days.” A recent Gallup Polls shows only 26% think the nation is on the “right track.” In this environment, the status quo is toxically unpopular. Kabaservice observed, “for a lot of Democrats, moderation is identified with neoliberalism.” As a result, Democrats, especially the politically engaged primary voter, equate upsetting the status quo with the left wing of the party. Shapiro, a smooth and competent center-left moderate, does not code as “disrupter.”  

The problem for Democrats is that voters object to the status quo, but they are not looking to the left for solutions. Will Marshall, the president of Washington’s Progressive Policy Institute, told me, “Trump is sliding [in popularity]” but “voters trust Republicans on almost all the issues that they define as most important.” Democrats think Trump’s loss is their gain. But Marshall learned much from polling and focus groups of non-college voters. “You ask [them] who does the Democratic Party represent? And they say, ‘the groups,’” he said. “They’re not wrong. The Democratic Party is highly responsive to well organized entrenched interest and constituency groups.”  

In 2028, Shapiro, and every other Democrat for that matter, are caught between the rock of “neoliberalism” and the hard place of entrenched Washington interest groups. Selecting the “moderate” path places a Democrat on the opposite side of the electorate’s mood. But opting for a left-liberal disrupter puts them on the wrong side of the issues. In the latter scenario, Marshall predicts, “it could very well be that Trump’s unpopular … and you could have a Republican who could create enough distance with Trump, and they would have an inherent advantage on the issues, which I think a lot of Democrats don’t realize.”

Rejecting the left and moderate track, Shapiro, or any Democrat, must prove they are neither a neoliberal nor captured by the “groups.” Kabaservice is right in arguing that, “Politics is like chess, the center of the board is the best place to be.” But in 2026, the center is not status quo politicking. The old Democratic Party’s left-versus-moderate battles are relics of a pre-Trump era. Marshall believes this is the key that picks the political lock. Regular “normie” voters, unlike committed partisans, are not divided along a left-right continuum. He shared, “This a hugely polarized society. But it’s not as ideological, dogmatic or as doctrinaire as Washington.” Radical pragmatism is Marshall’s answer to a divided .01% America, which he defines as, “Get the job done. Be pragmatic. Don’t be dogmatic. Look at what really needs fixing and just have a laser focus on getting the job done.”

Gil Troy has written the book on Will Marshall’s radical pragmatism. His work, Why Moderates Make the Best Presidents, outlines the “muscular moderation” that makes for a successful president. He thinks Shapiro needs to “trigger constructive passion” to solve what he sees as Shapiro’s “nice Jewish boy vibe.” But Shapiro’s pivot from milquetoast moderate to radical pragmatist is complicated by his Jewish question. Raised in an observant Jewish home, Shapiro’s Judaism shapes his liberalism and a commitment to a Jewish state. Once a non-issue in the Democratic Party, the 2023 Gaza War brought Democratic divisions over Israel to the fore.

Shapiro’s Jewish faith is not an issue with the wider Democratic electorate so much as it is with the progressive left. Seven percent of all voters, Progressive leftists pack a wallop as the political demographic most likely to volunteer, donate, vote, and work in politics. This group has also made support for Israel into a political litmus test. Troy sees rough sailing for Shapiro with a group whose, in his words, “defining political experience in college was ‘From River to the Sea.’”

But Shapiro’s Jewish question is simply a symptom of a much larger Democratic quandary. The political space between the progressive left, who exercise outsized influence in the primaries, and normie America, has become a chasm.

A recent New York Times poll shows 79% of working-class voters oppose transgender birth males playing in women’s sports. This is nearly double the number of registered Democrats who support such a policy. The most effective political ad of 2024, “Kamala is for they, them. President Trump is for you,” hit Democrats in this progressive soft spot. Most Americans are not hateful bigots, yet they also think trans-women should not play in varsity women’s sports. Any politician who does, is, in the minds of most normie voters, delusional. Immigration is the same story. According to one poll, 62% of voters object to ICE’s tactics. But less than one-third agree with the progressive mantra, “abolish ICE.”

The normie-progressive gap is also evident when it comes to climate change and cheap energy. According to Pew, 70% of registered Democrats think human activity has promoted climate change a “great deal.” Less than half of American voters agree with that position. Two-thirds of likely voters support greater oil and gas production. Progressive Democrats, meanwhile, push for a quicker transition to green energy. As scientifically and climatically sound as this position may be, the 2028 Republican nominee could hold the political high-ground on cheap gas in an era when it costs $4 a gallon. It is just a political reality.

The gulf between normie America and progressive elites is the very life force of Trumpism. For all of the president’s bluster, his voters, many of whom do not even like him personally, see him as a creative-destructive force that exposed the fallacies of progressive orthodoxy. Shapiro, by contrast, promises to show voters “Where We Keep the Light.” If that light shows the governor to be a stay-the-course moderate or a down-the-line progressive, his presidential campaign will be brief.

Marshall has not endorsed any Democratic candidate for 2028. But he learned a thing or two about winning from his time as Bill Clinton’s “ideas factory” in the 1990s. He shared with me, “I think Pennsylvanians look at Josh Shapiro; they see somebody who's pragmatic not doctrinaire. Somebody who's accessible. Relatable … somebody who can get the job done.” This has moved the political needle in Pennsylvania from .01 to 60%. Where We Keep the Light is his opening bid to do the same in 2028.

Jeff H. Bloodworth is professor of American political history at Gannon University and a Fellow with the Truman National Security Project. Follow him on X: @jhueybloodworth.