Gov. Shapiro touts violent crime reduction in Chester, reiterates his command of National Guard in face of Trump threats
There were no gun homicides in Chester this summer, officials said, the safest stretch for the Delaware County community in decades.
Gov. Josh Shapiro said Wednesday that the once crime-ridden city of Chester is now a “model for other cities” after recent efforts to combat gun violence in the Delaware County community led to reductions in crime.
“We brought everyone together around the table, and it worked,” said Shapiro, marking the five-year point of a joint crime-reduction initiative involving his administration, Pennsylvania State Police, Delaware County law enforcement, and Chester leaders.
Violent crime in Chester between 2020 and 2024 decreased 15%, Shapiro said, while shootings were down 50% during the five-year period. That mirrors a national downward trend in crime, including in Philadelphia, which saw a historic drop in homicides last year and a vast reduction in gun violence.
Delaware County District Attorney Jack Stollsteimer joined Shapiro to tout what he described as the beginning of a revitalization for Chester, which had weathered decades of job and factory losses combined with a surge in violent crime in the years before the pandemic.
Stollsteimer credited the data-driven law enforcement initiative with reducing gun violence in the city, which he said had no gun-related homicides this summer, marking the “most safe stretch in the city of Chester, literally, in decades.” There has been one homicide this summer, according to Chester police, down from seven in 2024.
Comparing Shapiro’s role to the leadership of Eagles general manager Howie Roseman, Stollsteimer said the governor’s office helped provide resources — both staffing and financial — to combat crime. That included local assistance from the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Gun Violence Task Force as well as state troopers, he said.
Stollsteimer also credited State Sen. John Kane, a Democrat, for helping to secure Chester around $2.6 million in grants for community programs and law enforcement from the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency, a state-federal partnership aimed at combating violence.
While on the topic of crime, Shapiro reiterated that his administration was prepared for the possibility of President Donald Trump sending National Guard troops into the state as the White House continues to threaten troop deployments in Democratic-led jurisdictions in an effort to combat crime.
The governor was adamant that he, not the president, was in command of Pennsylvania’s National Guard.
While Trump has considerable power over National Guard troops in Washington, his federalizing of the Guard in California this summer to crack down on crime and aid immigration enforcement has drawn legal challenges.
“I can deploy the troops of our Guard within the borders of our Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and I’ve done so,” Shapiro said, citing his deployment of troops in weather emergencies and to Europe to train Ukrainian forces.
He added: “I think that it is dangerous when a commander in chief of the United States tries to usurp power from the commander in chief of the state. It sets up a conflict.”