News & Brews June 17, 2026
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Pa. Dems vote to slash school choice
Yesterday, Democrats on the Pa. House Education Committee advanced a bill that would dramatically slash funding for Pennsylvania’s wildly popular tax credit scholarship programs. The bill, which was opposed by all Republicans on the committee, would cut funding for the scholarships by more than $100 million over two years, meaning 30,000 students would lose their education funding. Of course, Democrats have long opposed school choice, and if they gain a government trifecta this year, we can expect them to act immediately to push legislation like this through both chambers to Gov. Shapiro’s desk. And Shapiro, who has blocked school choice in the past despite his empty rhetoric, would likely sign it.
Data center fight is ‘scrambling’ Pa. politics
The Guardian examines how the heated debate over data centers in Pennsylvania “has embroiled state lawmakers trying to hit pause in a fight with Josh Shapiro, their Democratic governor and a presidential hopeful who wants to make Pennsylvania a leader in the nation’s fight for AI supremacy.” And local debate in Pa. “has become an emblem of the complicated national politics of data centers in the US.”
Analyzing Philly schools’ ‘job cut saga’
The past several weeks have been a mess of dire predictions of job cuts at Philly schools alternating with confusion when those dire predictions suddenly changed. City & State PA examines the “tumultuous weeks of will-they-or-won’t-they speculation,” looking at “how we got here – and what’s next.” One big takeaway: “For the School District of Philadelphia, the past month-plus has laid bare its fraught relationship with Philadelphia City Council.”
Pa. Supreme Court says Krasner misled judges
The Inquirer reports, “In a forceful and scolding opinion, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that [Philadelphia] District Attorney Larry Krasner’s office misled the courts, ‘violated its duty of candor,’ and submitted false statements when asking a judge to vacate a 2004 murder conviction.” In fact, the court ruled “that prosecutors’ pattern of misleading judges in seeking to overturn murder convictions is so troubling and recurrent that, going forward, before Krasner’s office seeks such relief, judges must notify the state attorney general’s office and allow it to review the case.”
Largest U.S. beef processor closing Pa. plant
The Wall Street Journal reports that JBS, the largest U.S. beef processor, is closing a Souderton beef processing plant that employs about 1,700 people. “Meatpacking companies” like JBS “are under tremendous financial pressure with the U.S. cattle herd at its lowest level since 1951,” the Journal notes. “Meatpackers are losing around $300 per head of cattle that runs through their plant, according to analyst estimates, as livestock prices continue to rise. The cattle shortage has resulted in record-high beef prices for American consumers.”