All five of Pennsylvania’s living former governors, both Republicans and Democrats, released a statement on Monday calling on state officials to prioritize the safety and security of Gov. Josh Shapiro. 

The bipartisan letter comes days after Pennsylvania Treasurer Stacy Garrity — Shapiro’s leading Republican opponent in this year’s gubernatorial race — said the state would not pay for security upgrades at Shapiro’s private home.

“Combatting political violence and keeping our elected officials safe should always be nonpartisan and a priority,” Democratic former Govs. Tom Wolf and Ed Rendell wrote in a statement with GOP former Govs. Tom Corbett, Mark Schweiker and Tom Ridge.

The security upgrades were already made to Shapiro’s privately-owned family home in Abington, outside of Philadelphia, following the arson attack on the state-owned governor’s mansion in Harrisburg last year. State Police said such upgrades were necessary because Shapiro and his family lived in their private home while repairs were undertaken at the governor’s mansion after the fire.

Shapiro and prosecutors have said that the attack, which occurred on the first night of Passover, was antisemitic in nature, citing the perpetrator’s targeting of Shapiro over his stance on Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.

The former governors did not specifically mention Garrity, though they did refer directly to the “unspeakable attack” that occurred at the governor’s residence while he and his family were asleep. 

“For us, the attack on Pennsylvania’s First Family was particularly upsetting,” the governors wrote. “In the aftermath of that attack we ask the state’s current leaders and legislators to make the safety and security of the governor and his family a priority.” 

Garrity told reporters last Thursday that the state’s procurement rules don’t allow public funds to be used to pay for construction work on property that is not state-owned, SpotlightPA reported. 

Garrity insisted she was not motivated by politics, saying she calls “balls and strikes here at Treasury.”

A spokesperson for Shapiro said last week that Garrity’s announcement was “a completely unprecedented and shameful political action without legal basis.”

A group of eight leading Senate Democrats released a statement on Tuesday evening urging President Donald Trump to “clearly reinforce the opposition of the U.S. government to Israeli government actions that set the conditions for irreversible annexation” of the West Bank when he meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House on Wednesday.

The statement emphasizes Senate Democrats’ opposition to Israel expanding its control over settlements in the West Bank, which Israel’s Security Cabinet approved measures to help facilitate on Sunday ahead of Netanyahu’s visit to Washington this week.

“We are deeply troubled by the Israeli government’s decision to blatantly consolidate administrative control over and set the conditions to expand settlements into the West Bank,” the senators wrote. “The Israeli government’s actions contravene decades of bipartisan United States policy, including that expressed by President Trump, which asserts the United States supports a two-state solution and that it is not in the U.S. national security interest to support annexation of the West Bank.”

“We have long expressed our concern that these reckless moves make the possibility of a two-state solution, where Israelis and Palestinians can live side by side in peace and security, further out of reach,” the statement continued. 

The group said they “urge Prime Minister Netanyahu to reverse course. When President Trump meets with Prime Minister Netanyahu this week, we also urge the President to clearly reinforce the opposition of the U.S. government to Israeli government actions that set the conditions for irreversible annexation.”

The statement was signed by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY); Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), the Senate Democratic whip; and Sens. Jack Reed (D-RI),  Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH),  Mark Warner (D-VA), Chris Coons (D-DE), Brian Schatz (D-HI) and Patty Murray (D-WA). The senators who joined Schumer and Durbin are, respectively, the ranking members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Foreign Relations Committee, Intelligence Committee, the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations and the Senate Appropriations Committee.

Trump has held firm on his opposition to Israeli settlement expansion since saying last September that he would “not allow Israel to annex the West Bank.” Trump reiterated this position in an interview with Axios on Tuesday. 

He said following a meeting with Netanyahu at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla., in late December that the two were still on separate sides of the issue, but expressed confidence that all parties would reach “a conclusion,” though he declined to offer specifics.

“Well, we have had a discussion, big discussion, for a long time on the West Bank. And I wouldn’t say we agree on the West Bank 100%, but we will come to a conclusion on the West Bank,” Trump said at the time. “It’ll be announced at an appropriate time, but [Netanyahu] will do the right thing. I know that. I know him very well. He will do the right thing.”

Several leading Jewish organizations in Virginia and Washington issued a joint statement on Thursday slamming state Del. Sam Rasoul and calling for his resignation as chair of the Virginia House of Delegates’ Education Committee, days after the Roanoke Democrat announced that he is considering running for Congress in 2026. 

The statement — from the Jewish Community Relations Councils in the greater Washington area, Richmond, the Tidewater (including Virginia Beach) and the Virginia Peninsula (Newport News) — accused Rasoul, who is Palestinian American, of using rhetoric that fuels antisemitism. 

It did not mention Rasoul’s possible congressional bid. The four organizations are all nonprofits and prohibited from engaging in political advocacy. 

“Del. Rasoul’s antisemitic rhetoric dates back several years, and his vitriol has continued to increase in recent weeks. We are speaking out now because the situation demands it,” Vicki Fishman, director of Virginia government and community relations at the Washington JCRC, told Jewish Insider on Thursday.

Instead, the Jewish groups called for Rasoul to resign as chair of the education committee in the statehouse.

“Sam Rasoul has had the opportunity to provide children with a supportive learning environment and the responsibility to help keep them safe in their classrooms. He has repeatedly failed on both counts and is no longer fit to serve,” the organizations stated. Rasoul has faced scrutiny from Jewish leaders in the state for months, but he remains in the leadership role. 

“Del. Rasoul uses his position and platform to regularly spew vitriol toward the Jewish people — calling Israel ‘depraved’ and ‘evil’ while re-defining Zionism to falsely disparage it as a ‘supremacist ideology,’” the organizations wrote. “Del. Rasoul’s words are precisely the type of destructive rhetoric that fuels antisemitic attacks.” 

Rasoul said his decision to run for a U.S. House seat will depend on whether Virginia moves toward redistricting next year, a process that the House of Delegates appears likely to approve.