Republican candidate for governor Stacy Garrity campaigns in ‘not safe’ Philly after taking in Temple-Penn State football game

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Republican gubernatorial hopeful and current state Treasurer Stacy Garrity campaigned in Philadelphia on Saturday, braving a Democratic stronghold that voted for Gov. Josh Shapiro by a 72-percentage-point margin in 2022.

Garrity reportedly made several stops around North Philly and took in the Temple-Penn State football game at the Linc.

At a stop at a private home in Port Richmond, she told supporters that reducing taxes and balancing the budget would be two of her biggest priorities as governor.

“We have the fifth-highest tax burden in the nation, and Pennsylvanians can’t afford it,” she told a group of 20 people. “And as a state treasurer, I can tell you we are spending $5 billion more every single year than what we bring in.”

One of Garrity’s earlier scheduled stops was in the district of state Rep. Andre Carroll, a Democrat who criticized Garrity’s support for White House priorities.

“Over 2 million Pennsylvanians are going to experience some kind of interruption to their health care,” he told WHYY News. “And that is set in stone because of Republicans’ vote on H.R.1, AKA the ‘Big Beautiful Bill.’”

Economic and social themes

Garrity told her Port Richmond audience that she declined invitations to run for governor for a year and a half, saying she was “happy being the treasurer.” She said she finally agreed after seeing “the direction that our beautiful commonwealth was headed.”

“Everything is too expensive in Josh Shapiro’s Pennsylvania,” she said. “And when I first came into office in early 2021, we had … a huge surplus from federal COVID money, about $18 billion. And every year I saw it go down, down, down, down.”

She added that she believes small businesses are hampered by overregulation.

“It’s hard to do business, because there’s too many regulations, too many forms to fill out,” she said.

That appealed to Pedro Ruben, a small-business owner from the Dominican Republic who says he will vote for the first time this year after getting naturalized in late 2024.

“As a small-business owner, we have this challenge of getting financial support and also to get funds for our businesses to grow,” he said, adding that he thinks there isn’t enough guidance to help small businesses to obtain public funds that are available to them.

At the event, Garrity also said that “people don’t really know what Shapiro believes” because “he’s never been seriously challenged.” As an example, she pointed to the participation of transgender girls and women in sports, an issue that has become a prominent focus for Republican politicians despite it affecting only a few athletes in Pennsylvania.

“He’s not the moderate that he says,” she said. “He believes in biological males competing against our girls in sports. Yeah, that’s a big move.”

Shapiro has said his administration will defend the rights of gay and transgender individuals and called supporters of a ban on transgender athletes “extremist.” He has also declined to say if he would veto a bill passed in the state Senate that would bar transgender girls and women from competing on female teams at public schools and colleges.

Crime and public safety

During her campaign, Garrity has regularly called Philadelphia “not safe” and criticized the city’s approach to crime and drugs.

“If you walk by Independence Hall, you’re going to see drug addicts, crime and filth on the streets, and that is a great metaphor for where our commonwealth is heading without proper leadership,” she told the Pennsylvania Leadership Conference last year.

Asked about how she would tackle the issue as governor, she told WHYY News she would “work with local leaders.”

“I think every community that has a drug issue is worth fighting for,” she said. “But it’s going to take all of us. It’s going to take local leaders. It’s going to take every level of law enforcement, everybody working together.”

Garrity blamed Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner, whom she has discussed trying to remove but won reelection last year with more than 76% of the vote. Philadelphia violent crime peaked during the pandemic but is now seeing a record low, along with a record in homicide clearance rates.

Carroll called it hypocritical for Garrity to bash the city while seeking votes there.

“I think the things we say with our mouths as lawmakers and folks who are elected leaders is representative of how we will show up in the halls of power,” he said.

The Trump impact

Garrity, a self-described ally of Donald Trump, was endorsed by the president in January. Garrity told attendees at a fundraiser in February that she had to answer a single question from the president before he gave her his endorsement, as reported by Jaxon White for WITF.

Garrity and the White House have since declined WITF’s requests for information about the content of the question or her answer, but Garrity had previously joined some other Republicans in casting doubt on the results of the 2020 election, which Joe Biden won. She has since publicly backed away from those comments.

Last month, Trump invited Garrity to the White House for an in-person endorsement in the Oval Office, during which he called her “a spectacular person.”

Democrats, like Carroll, have criticized her closeness to the president, whose popularity has dropped significantly during his second term.

“The writing is on the wall,” Carroll said. “The Republicans are on their last leg and they are desperately trying anything that they have in their arsenal to hold onto power. The thing is they have not made life more affordable. That was a promise from them. They have not delivered for working families. That was a promise from them.”

However, Trump’s endorsement is helping some residents, like Sean Hunt, make a decision in the race.

“I know President Trump. I’m very familiar with his policies, and most of them are working very well, and she supports most of them,” Hunt said at the Port Richmond event. “So it would just be good to put somebody who he backs, who’s going to carry out his agenda, at the state level.”

Hunt, a military contractor who recently retired from the Air Force, characterized the race as “capitalism versus socialism” and said he went from being an independent voter to registering as a Republican after Trump became president.

“I just like his style,” he said. “He explains things very clearly, breaks it down to where anybody, if you just listen to what he’s saying with all his business experience and wisdom, makes it very easy to understand.”

A Republican came to Philly

Garrity is facing an uphill battle in her quest to unseat Shapiro, who currently commands a 2-1 lead over her, according to multiple recent polls, in a race many Republicans have already written off. Some of that is driven by Philadelphia, where Republicans make up only about 12% of voters and Shapiro’s recent campaign event drew hundreds of people.

Philadelphia Republican ward leader David Rodriguez applauded Garrity’s appearance in the heavily Democratic city.

“A lot of people say, ‘Well, Republicans don’t come to Philadelphia.’ Well, this one did,” he said at the Port Richmond event.

Philadelphia resident Yolanda Mitchell Taylor echoed that sentiment and called on her neighbors to stop voting based on party.

“Vote individuals,” she said. “Doing the same dumb thing, that doesn’t get you any results.”