News & Brews September 17, 2026
Get News & Brews in your inbox each day: Subscribe here!
With AI speech, Shapiro eyes 2028
My, how times (and Shapiro’s positions) change. Just a year or so after bragging about bringing data centers to Pennsylvania, Gov. Shapiro today plans to “enter a new frontier for Democrats pitching the AI conversation toward 2028 today, calling for the U.S. to push China for ‘practical guardrails to reduce risks to the American people’ and muscular federal regulation.” So reports POLITICO’s Playbook. Basically, this means Shapiro will “blast Trump” and say a lot of things that are completely opposite to what he said last year when he was all build, baby, buildon data centers. All this will take place at the AI Horizons Summit in Pittsburgh.
Pa.’s Amazon data centers ‘fueled by lucrative tax break’
Capital & Main, a nonprofit publication that receives much of its funding from left-wing groups including government unions, reports that “after vowing to spend $20 billion on data centers across Pennsylvania, Amazon is now quietly reaping the rewards of a controversial, yet lucrative state tax exemption, records show.” Last year, with much fanfare, Gov. Shapiro announced Amazon would be building two data centers in Pennsylvania, with more to come. “Since then, the company’s portfolio across the state has grown. It recently applied for a local permit to build 36 data centers at a gas powered, 4.5-gigawatt data center campus where a legacy coal plant in Homer City once stood in southwestern Pennsylvania.”
The story continues: “The company has received the tax incentive for two data center locations so far,” according to the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue. “Yet, as Amazon positions itself as one of the state’s largest data center customers, aided by a discount on the 6% sales and use tax on equipment it has pledged to buy, store or use in Pennsylvania, advocates and legislators on both sides of the aisle are pushing to repeal that subsidy altogether.” For context, we’ve long opposed government’s picking winners and losers, including providing special tax breaks to any particular industry.
Where will Krasner fallout lead?
Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner came to office as one of the first in a wave of George Soros-backed progressive prosecutors in the country. Now, after a federal judge recently suggested Krasner may have committed crimes, the Philly Inquirer reports that “the fallout is likely just beginning.” And beyond legal repercussions, “political repercussions could arise as well.”
”While Krasner’s Republican enemies reiterated their long-held disdain for the reform-oriented prosecutor, no elected Democrats immediately came to his defense. And some Democrats in the city have quietly begun discussing potential contingency plans if Krasner is forced from office before the end of his third term in 2030.”
‘Republicans reel’ as ‘deep red areas’ in play
Backing up from Pennsylvania for a minute to look at the national political landscape, The New York Times explains just how bad it is for Republicans this year. “Less than seven weeks before the midterm elections, the political environment has deteriorated so badly for Republicans that the battlefield now extends deep into states and districts Mr. Trump carried three times, often by double digits.” Indeed, “Trump’s diminished standing, as well as voter anger about high prices brought on by tariffs and the war with Iran, are causing serious problems for Republicans across the map. And economic trends appear to be going the wrong way for the party.” In short, the Republican Party is bracing for what could be historic midterm losses.
‘235-0: The choice Shapiro never talks about’
Gov. Shapiro has always been open about his support for abortion. Yet, he’s offered no similar support for other choices, such as adoption or foster care. The Pennsylvania Family Council’s Dan Bartkowiak writes that a review of Shapiro’s X account since he took office shows that he has promoted abortion 128 times directly and 107 times indirectly but has not posted about adoption or foster care once.
