How Josh Shapiro is trying to turn out Black voters in Philly, a crucial group for Democrats

The Philadelphia playground was already packed by the time Josh Shapiro arrived. The attorney general and candidate for Pennsylvania governor paraded into North Philly on Saturday, where he was cheered by neighborhood activists who wanted a fist bump and welcomed by elected officials who wanted his ear.

He paused for a moment to take a selfie video with Muriel Taylor, a 65-year-old grandmother who couldn’t wait to tell her sister whom she’d met.

She was thrilled, no matter the obvious dynamic: Shapiro is a white politician from an affluent suburb in Montgomery County who was crashing a party in the heart of the city’s Strawberry Mansion section, a mostly Black community that’s one of the most economically depressed in the city.

“We as Black people have the ability to determine who’s for real and who’s not,” Taylor said.

The stop was part of a concerted effort by Shapiro’s campaign to energize its base with just two months left in the general election campaign for governor. Black voters in Philadelphia have long been considered among the most reliable constituencies for Democrats trying to win statewide, and the city has upward of a million registered voters. More than 4 in 10 are Black.

The city is expected to overwhelmingly back Shapiro. But the question remains whether voters will turn out in strong enough numbers to match GOP strength in largely white rural and exurban communities. The party in power often struggles to energize voters in the midterms, when turnout is typically lower than in presidential election years, though enthusiasm on the left has surged since the Supreme Court in June issued an unpopular decision overturning Roe v. Wade.

Shapiro said he’s not taking the city for granted. To shore up support, he’s made a series of stops in Philadelphia, and his campaign is spending $1.2 million through Election Day on digital advertising that targets Black voters across the state. The ads center on education and gun violence, two issues that perennially top lists of the most important issues to voters in the city.

» READ MORE: 70% of Philadelphians believe public safety is the most important issue facing the city, poll finds

The digital spending comes atop a massive $16 million statewide television advertising campaign, much of which is an effort to characterize his Republican opponent, state Sen. Doug Mastriano, as outside the mainstream. Shapiro and his allies have repeatedly hit Mastriano on issues of race, including the recent revelation that Mastriano donned a Confederate Army uniform for a faculty photo in 2014 when he taught at the Army War College.

Mastriano, who beat eight opponents to win the Republican nomination for governor in May, has campaigned in the Philadelphia suburbs, but has not held or attended public events in the city.

Shapiro on Friday campaigned with a handful of Black elected officials and Sen. Cory Booker (D., N.J.) at Booker’s (no relation), a Black-owned restaurant in West Philly. And after his stop in Strawberry Mansion on Saturday, he appeared on a Zoom event with Rev. Alyn E. Waller, who leads the Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church and regularly hosts virtual conversations with political candidates.

“I’m not someone who’s new to them,” Shapiro said in an interview Saturday in North Philly. “I’ve been to these communities many, many times.”

Shapiro has in some cases relied on his running mate, state Rep. Austin Davis, who is Black, to deliver his message in communities of color. In other cases, he’s been welcomed by local Black Democrats. On Saturday, that was City Council President Darrell L. Clarke, who hosted the community event in Strawberry Mansion and said he’s worked with Shapiro on policy for 15 years.

Clarke said voters in his district are alarmed by “extreme views of other people from the Republican Party.” But he also said Shapiro is pragmatic and laid the groundwork in Clarke’s mostly Black district by talking to voters about public safety and education even before he was the attorney general.

“This is not the first time Josh has come around,” Clarke said.

Public safety has become the No. 1 issue for large swaths of voters in Philadelphia, where shootings have surged since 2020, with last year being the deadliest in generations. This year, homicides are continuing at a comparable pace.

And as Republicans have tried to portray Democrats as soft on crime, Shapiro has taken on a decidedly pro-policing tone, touting an endorsement from the police union, proposing incentives for cops amid recruiting shortages, and saying his administration would hire 2,000 new officers statewide.

But the digital ads don’t mention police, and instead focus on community activists like Tyrone Sims, a volunteer basketball coach who lives in the city’s Cobb’s Creek section.

Sims said Shapiro came to the neighborhood in 2016 after 15-year-old Tyhir Barnes was killed leaving a basketball game, then came again last month for a basketball tournament in Barnes’ memory. He said his neighbors remember that.

“A lot of times our community don’t see people as high up as the attorney general inquiring and asking about what’s going on in the neighborhood,” said Sims, 69. “But he came through strongly.”

Taylor said stemming the flow of guns into the city is among the top issues she wants to see the next governor face. But she thinks voters in the city will ultimately turn out for Shapiro because they’re worried about the alternative.

“Somebody that parades around in a Confederate costume,” she said, “has an opinion about us as a people that is just very, very negative.”