Pennsylvania in Focus

(The Center Square) - At a rally launching Gov. Josh Shapiro and Lt. Gov. Austin Davis’s re-election campaign Thursday, the stakes were made clear: the 2026 election is about the trajectory of the nation as a whole. Amid swirling rumors about a presidential bid, Shapiro pledged his commitment to act as a servant leader ready for another four years in office. Over the course of the evening, speaker...

(The Center Square) – For 67 million people relying on electricity from the regional power grid, PJM, cheaper utility bills in 2026 are little more than a pipe dream. It’s not an unexpected blow, despite moves from the Trump administration and state regulators to keep prices in check. Why? Because there’s simply not enough power generation – from gas and nuclear plants, wind and solar farms and ba...

(The Center Square) - The most recent Pennsylvania budget was tight, but it did add a few new line items, including $5 million toward research for neurodegenerative diseases like ALS, Parkinson’s, and Alzheimer’s. On Friday, Gov. Josh Shapiro, Secretary of Health Dr. Debra Bogen, and Rep. Kyle Mullins, D-Peckville, joined researchers at the University of Pittsburgh to mark the investment. Mullins...

(The Center Square) – Keeping Pennsylvania’s scales tipped into the red ahead of the 2026 midterms was underscored again this week as Vice President J.D. Vance visited Allentown, stumping for his boss’s economic policies and bringing Republican hopefuls into the limelight with him. While there, he told a crowd gathered at Uline Shipping Supplies in Alburtis that “his job every single day is to mak...

(The Center Square) – Genetic testing has drastically changed what we’re able to know about ourselves and our families. It can inform individuals about their bodies and health and connect them to the past through ancestral lines. For the past two decades, consumers have been handing over their genetic information to private industry for the chance to make those connections. Throughout those two de...

(The Center Square) - Intense polarization and the alarming rise of partisan political violence has left many Americans wondering about the nation’s trajectory. That’s why Gov. Josh Shapiro and Utah Gov. Spencer Cox joined journalist Savannah Guthrie for a discussion on the topic at the National Cathedral in Washington D.C. Tuesday evening. Cox said the two made each other’s acquaintance within th...

(The Center Square) – Questions surrounding taxpayer money spent upgrading the governor's private residence were legally elevated Tuesday. Senate Republicans, eager to curb state spending — and to play the foil to Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro — have long had their eye on excessive spending from the executive office. Tuesday, the Senate Intergovernmental Operations committee announced that they’ve...

(The Center Square) - Health care workers in Altoona held a vigil Monday night to demand increased safety for hospital employees. The event came weeks after UPMC emergency room technician Travis Dunn was brutally attacked by a patient, leaving him with a skull fracture and brain bleed among other injuries. Between the physical demands of their jobs and the volatility of working with patients, heal...

(The Center Square) - With budget season disappearing into the rearview, advocates for home health care services aren't wasting a minute. Though the programs saw a $21 million investment toward workers within the self-directed care model, those appropriations fell woefully short of the state’s own recommendations to stabilize the industry. On Tuesday, the Pennsylvania Homecare Association said pro...

(The Center Square) – Rapid expansion of data centers in the mid-Atlantic region leaves its power grid’s operator, PJM, standing at a crossroads: how can electricity supply keep up with exponential growth in demand without spiking bills for ratepayers? After a Wednesday meeting with all of the organizations members – which include utility companies, state regulators, power plants, transmission pro...

(The Center Square) - Since the advent of DNA testing, law enforcement agencies have been able to prosecute crimes - and exonerate the wrongly convicted - with greater certainty than ever before. Though not perfect, genetic technology has brought justice to scores of violent crime victims and their families, and with them has come what the American Civil Liberties Union called a “Pandora’s box” of...

(The Center Square) – A suspected terrorist arrested in Kansas earlier this month is a licensed truck driver in Pennsylvania, according to federal authorities. Akhror Bozorov fled his native Uzbekistan after law enforcement there issued an arrest warrant in late 2022. The 31-year-old, not an American citizen, is accused of recruiting on behalf of an unnamed jihadist terrorist group and distributin...

(The Center Square) – After six long years, the fate of Pennsylvania’s entry into a multi-state emissions curbing program is settled. And much to legislative Republicans' joy, there will be no Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative in the commonwealth. Nor will the uncertainty of it spike utility bills for customers already feeling the financial strain from an unpredictable economy.  Support this podc...

(The Center Square) – After a 135-day wait and $12 billion in taxpayer money collected, the state cemented a spending plan for all of it, and more. Pennsylvania's final budget came in at $50.1 billion, less than what Gov. Josh Shapiro initially asked for but well north of what Republican leadership had been looking to spend. The legislation includes much of what Democrats had asked for in budgets...

(The Center Square) – While many may think of the state’s highest court as an arbiter of the intersection between law and culture, taxpayers often take a more direct hit from the judges’ decisions. That is, right in the wallet. On Tuesday, voters across Pennsylvania overwhelmingly chose to retain David Wecht, Christine Donohue and Kevin Dougherty for another 10 years, preserving the state Supreme...

(The Center Square) - Attempts to turn a run-of-the-mill judicial retention choice on Pennsylvania ballots into a political battleground proved unsuccessful Tuesday. Just after 9 p.m., multiple media outlets declared that voters had elected David Wecht, Christine Donohue and Kevin Dougherty to maintain their seats for another 10 years, maintaining the court’s 5-2 liberal majority. Conservative pol...

(The Center Square) - A coalition of lawmakers from both chambers of the Pennsylvania General Assembly joined activists at the Capitol Wednesday to demand billionaires pay more taxes. With the slogan, “Tax billionaires, fund PA,” the group spoke in support of a package of bills that would generate more revenue for the state by closing loopholes and eliminating tax breaks for corporations and the r...

(The Center Square) - While visiting Harrisburg on Monday, U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick took questions on several issues, including the federal shutdown and its impact on Pennsylvanians. McCormick was touring a facility that offers cutting-edge treatment programs to veterans suffering from neurological and psychiatric issues, just one of many groups feeling the effects of the government shutdown. They...

(The Center Square) - School cell phone bans are sweeping the nation, and with a Senate bill waiting for a vote, Pennsylvania may be the next state to act. The Senate Education Committee convened Tuesday for a hearing with educators, policymakers, and even students to discuss the practicality and wisdom of taking tech out of kids’ hands throughout the school day. With a mental health crisis among...

(The Center Square) – Since July 1, taxpayers have given the state roughly $89 million each day, even as months have passed without any of it going into the programs it's meant to support. It’s a crude figure calculated by dividing the state’s $10.1 billion in revenue collected since the official start of the commonwealth’s “new” fiscal year by 113 – the exact number of days Pennsylvania has opera...

(The Center Square) - For months, the looming threat of higher insurance premiums has hung over the commonwealth, while at the federal level, affordable health care access has been at the heart of the debate causing the government shutdown. Congress is rapidly running out of time to come to an agreement extending Affordable Care Act tax credits before the Nov. 1 open enrollment period begins. Tues...

(The Center Square) – The man accused of firebombing the Pennsylvania governor’s mansion in Harrisburg pleaded guilty to attempted murder, aggravated arson and terrorism on Tuesday. Cody Balmer also accepted blame for 22 counts of arson – one for each person asleep in the residence that night, including children ranging from 8 to 16 years old – and has been sentenced to 25-50 years in prison, acco...

(The Center Square) – The commonwealth’s divided government means “getting stuff done,” as Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro likes to say, doesn’t come easily. If it did, according to Republicans in the state, the commonwealth might become the “California of the East.” “If we weren’t here, knowing that he wants to be the Democratic nominee for president, just imagine the progressive policies he’d suppo...

(The Center Square) – There was a lot of talk at the state Capitol on Wednesday about a frustrating milestone: 100 days without a spending plan and no deal in sight. Instead, the Democrat majority House of Representatives marked up the Republican majority Senate’s stopgap budget, passed in its chamber two months ago, by $2.7 billion. Leaders say it’s the least that can be done after the Senate sen...

(The Center Square) – Domestic shale production in the Appalachian Basin may offer the easiest path toward protecting the nation’s energy supply and resisting reliance on geopolitical foes, says U.S. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum. The Trump administration official was recently in Pennsylvania to deliver a keynote address emphasizing the critical role the domestic shale industry plays, both...