Josh Shapiro says Donald Trump should learn to manage political violence by looking to Pennsylvania

Gov. Josh Shapiro made the case Tuesday during a speech in Pittsburgh that President Donald Trump has something to learn from Pennsylvania amid rising political violence.

Trump has escalated rhetoric about his political opponents in response to the fatal shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. He quickly blamed the “radical left” before there was a suspect. He has called on his supporters through official White House correspondence to “counter radical left violence” with “revenge” at the ballot box. His administration has threatened a federal crackdown on left-leaning groups bolstered by unsubstantiated claims.

In an impassioned speech to the Eradicate Hate Global Summit in Pittsburgh, Shapiro contrasted the president’s response with how Pennsylvania leaders have dealt with political violence.

The matter is personal for Shapiro, who with his family survived an arson attack on the Pennsylvania governor’s mansion in Harrisburg in April.

That attack, Shapiro noted, was one of many.

He recounted the 2018 Tree of Life synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh, the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history, which claimed 11 lives and led to the founding of the summit.

He also cited the attempted assassination of Trump last year in Butler. The killing of the United Health CEO in New York City, in which the suspect was arrested in Altoona. The assassination of former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband. The killing of Kirk in Utah.

“Different places, different people, different perspectives,” Shapiro said. “One common thread: people using violence to settle political differences.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s coming from one side or from the other, directed at one party or another, one person or another. It is all wrong, and it makes us all less safe,” said Shapiro, a potential contender for the presidency in 2028.

Shapiro had been staying at the governor’s mansion to celebrate Passover with his family when the home was lit on fire.

The suspected attacker, Cody Balmer, told a 911 dispatcher he would not take part in Shapiro’s “plans for what he wants to do to the Palestinian people,” leading some politicians to believe the arson could be a hate crime against the Jewish governor, including U.S. Sens. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), John Fetterman (D., Pa.), and Dave McCormick (R., Pa.). Balmer’s family said he was mentally ill and did not believe he was motivated by religion or politics.

Shapiro said in his speech that all the former living governors of Pennsylvania reached out to his family in support after the attack. He invited them to gather together at the governor’s mansion “to rededicate ourselves to upholding our commonwealth’s foundational values.”

He said former Democratic Govs. Tom Wolf and Ed Rendell and former Republican Govs. Tom Corbett, Mark Schweiker, and Tom Ridge attended with their spouses, as did family members of former Democratic Gov. Bob Casey Sr. and former Republican Gov. Dick Thornburgh, along with Laura Ellsworth, the summit’s founder.

“They are Democrats and they are Republicans, leaders of different generations from different parts of our commonwealth, but they were united in speaking and acting with moral clarity, making clear that hatred and violence has no place here in Pennsylvania,” Shapiro said.

Corbett, the state’s most recent Republican governor, introduced Shapiro‘s keynote speech at the summit and said “preventing hate-fueled violence is not a partisan issue, it is one that requires all of us around this country and around the world to work together.”

The governors of Pennsylvania, Shapiro argued, responded to the arson attack the best they could by focusing on unity and healing.

In contrast, he criticized Trump and his allies for responding to the Kirk shooting with calls for vengeance and cherry-picking which instances of violence to condemn, in turn raising the political temperature.

“I don’t care if it’s coming from the left or the right, we need to be universal in our condemnation, and the president has once again failed that leadership test, failed the morality test, and it makes us all less safe,” Shapiro argued.

Abigail Jackson, a White House spokesperson, said in a statement that “no one understands the dangers of political violence more than President Trump,” pointing to the two assassination attempts against him.

She said he gave “powerful and unifying remarks” after Kirk’s assassination, urging Americans ”to commit themselves to the American values for which Charlie Kirk lived and died,” including freedom of speech and the rule of law.

“But President Trump, and the entire Administration, will not hesitate to speak the truth — for years, radical leftists have slandered their political opponents as Nazis and Fascists, inspiring left-wing violence," Jackson said. “It must end.”

During his speech, Shapiro argued that some people will hear Trump’s “selective condemnation” and use it as permission to be violent themselves if it goes along with their narrative or “targets the other side.”

Shapiro said that, like the governors in Pennsylvania, political leaders should create the opportunity for respectful dialogue rather than threats of censorship coming from the White House.

“There is a better way,” Shapiro said. “That better way is the Pennsylvania way.”