With the Nov. 3 election less than one month away, Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro met Republican challenger Stacy Garrity for an hourlong debate Wednesday night — the only time the candidates are expected to face off in such a forum.
And the briskly paced hourlong debate largely echoed familiar themes, with Garrity seeking to attack Shapiro's leadership and future political ambitions, while he repeatedly sought to link her to President Donald Trump.
Shapiro is running for his second four-year gubernatorial term, while Garrity, the two-term state Treasurer and a retired U.S. Army Reserves colonel, has pledged to "turn around PA" if voters select her.
The debate moderators, anchor Lisa Sylvester of WPXI-Pittsburgh and reporter Dennis Owens of WHTM-Harrisburg, covered nearly a dozen issues with the candidates during the Harrisburg forum. The station did not allow an audience to attend. Neither candidate addressed reporters gathered in a separate room during the debate. Notably absent: Libertarian Ken Krawchuk, who will also appear on the gubernatorial ballot.
Data centers
Both Shapiro and Garrity have changed their positions on data center development within the past year, a fact the debate made clear from the outset by running tape of earlier supportive statements the candidates had made about the projects, followed by critical statements they've made more recently.
Shapiro touted his executive order setting rules for future data center development: "You've got to protect our air and water, and most importantly, you have to earn the support of the local community first."
Asked why his policy hadn't included an outright moratorium on development like those imposed in other states, Shapiro said "a moratorium is a timeline to get to a policy" — a pause his executive order made unnecessary, because it created "the strictest guardrails in the nation to ensure that our communities are protected."
Garrity, in her first answer of the evening, spent roughly half a minute acknowledging the anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, and then made the first of her criticisms of Shapiro, while going light on the details of her own approach.
Shapiro, she said, "listened to a poll. I actually held five listening sessions across the Commonwealth."
She reiterated her own support for a moratorium on data center construction, to allow local communities to set rules for future development. But as in the past, she didn't say how long she thought a moratorium should last.
"A real leader doesn't need that long of a pause," she said. "You get all the stakeholders around the table and you find out what you need to protect ratepayers and protect communities.… I come from the private sector, so I think he could get it done very quickly."
Skill games, gas prices
Among the most immediate questions facing state officials is how to best tax skill games, the unregulated slot-machine-like games that have cropped up in bars, gas stations and social clubs. A state Supreme Court decision this summer gave state officials until next week to create a regulatory scheme for the devices — a deadline Harrisburg will almost certainly not meet.
Shapiro reiterated his support for a 52 percent tax on the machines, consistent with the rate charged on slots and "other gaming in Pennsylvania, so that we wouldn't advantage one type of gaming over another."
Garrity favors a more modest monthly levy of $500 per machine each month, and said Shapiro's rate would hurt the businesses that installed the machines: "He knows that they can't survive at 52 percent."
The two also debated gas prices. Garrity also faulted Shapiro for not delivering on a promise in his first gubernatorial campaign: to offer a $250 gas-tax rebate per vehicle to Pennsylvania drivers. "I don't know about our listeners, but I didn't get my check in the mail," she said.
"Those rebate dollars that were available when I was campaigning were ultimately spent by the legislature before I was sworn in," Shapiro countered. As in a number of other exchanges, he said that future rebates or other gas-tax breaks required steps by the legislature.
"I'm open to that, but it requires an act of the legislature," he said of a tax break. "That's not something the governor can do on his own."
Shapiro also linked gas prices to Trump's foreign policy: "The reason why gas and diesel is at a record high is because of President Trump's war in Iran, a war that I oppose and a war that my opponent supports."
Garrity did not deny she'd supported military action in Iran, but elsewhere in the debate pushed back on the idea that she was in lockstep with Trump.
"The governor likes to say that I've pledged this oath of loyalty to the president," she said. But "nobody, I don't think, agrees with the president 100% of the time. … [T]ariffs would be a perfect example. While some tariffs have helped manufacturers, some have not."
Safety net programs
Shapiro and Garrity also tussled over the future of social-safety net programs in the Trump era, namely the effect of Trump's agenda on Medicaid, which covers health costs for lower-income households.
"We have about 700,000 Pennsylvanians who get their healthcare through Medicaid and through the Affordable Care Act" on a state-run insurance exchange, Shapiro said. More than half a million of them, he said, "are losing or will lose by January access to healthcare, an additional 143,000 are going to lose food assistance."
He blamed that on national Republicans including Trump, whose "One Big Beautiful Bill" pares back Medicaid spending by imposing work requirements, while providing tax cuts that provide the most benefits to the wealthy.
"That was a bill that I strongly opposed. I urged each member of our congressional delegation to vote against it. My opponent campaigned for it," said Shapiro.
Garrity reiterated her support for the work requirements.
"The intended purpose [of Medicaid] was to help pregnant women, moms and kids, seniors, people with disabilities, and so Congress is slowing it down because they want to make sure that it's there for the people that really need it."
'I don't know how you can look at yourself in the mirror'
Overall, the debate saw few fireworks, though there was a sharp exchange over election integrity. Shapiro said he was "open to putting a voter ID bill on my desk for my signature," provided the legislature could devise a measure that would not result in legitimate voters being disenfranchised.
"The next governor of this Commonwealth is going to have to decide who to certify in the presidential election of 2028," Shapiro added. "I'll certify whoever the people choose. I don't know that we can say the same about my opponent, who takes her direction on these matters seemingly from Donald Trump."
Garrity bristled at that statement, calling it "the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. I don't even know why you'd say that and how you can look at yourself in the mirror at night."
But when asked whether there was reason to doubt that Pennsylvania's elections were secure, Garrity hedged. "I think that there are always situations that you hear about in the Southeast [and] in Luzerne County," she said.
Then she faltered before attacking Shapiro again. "I am not saying that, you know, our — I would implement voter ID."
"The governor has consistently said … he can't do anything because he has a divided legislature. Well, that's not what real leadership is."
It's not clear what impact, if any, the debate will have on the race. But polling has consistently shown Shapiro with a strong lead going into the final weeks of the election: A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday showed Shapiro leading Garrity by 25 points.
"One of the country's most popular governors gets a rousing endorsement from Pennsylvania's likely voters in a race that looks like a rout," said Tim Malloy, a Quinnipiac polling analyst.
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