Name: How Gov. Shapiro Is Preparing To Defend Pennsylvanians From Federal Government Overreach
Uploaded: 2026-01-27T17:09:22.000Z
Duration: 8 min 20 s
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My guest tonight is the current governor and former attorney general of the great state of Pennsylvania.

Please welcome back to the Late Show, Governor Josh Shapiro.

Glad you made it up here through the storm.

I gotta tell you, on my way up here, I spent some time visiting with the folks at PennDOT, the folks who had been up 24 hours.

Plowing and making sure their neighbors are safe.

These folks in every state in our country do not get enough credit for what they do.

Of course, the other big story over the weekend is that another protester was killed in Minnesota, this time by agents of Customs and Border Protection.

While it is a chaotic scene, it seems clear the order of events when you watch the many angles.

You've been in many roles in your state, state Congress, county commissioner, attorney general, and now Governor.

Clearly you believe the government is a force for good.

What is your reaction to this violence and incitement coming from Homeland Security?

I do believe that government is a force for good.

And I believe this administration in Washington is using it for pure evil in Minnesota right now.

I think Americans are outraged by what they see.

And no matter how many times this administration tells us to not see what we're seeing with our own eyes, I think all that does is create more of a rift in our country.

And I know this certainly as a former chief law enforcement officer of our commonwealth.

I also just know this as a common sense American, that the mission in Minnesota must be terminated immediately.

What they are doing, what they are doing, what they are doing there is violating people's constitutional rights.

What we are seeing is a lawlessness from this administration that must stop.

I will just tell you that they're not abiding by common sense principles of policing.

Stopping people because they have an accent, Stephen.

Pulling people over and creating more chaos in our community instead of doing what actual law enforcement is supposed to do, which is to calm tensions and bring people together.

I will tell you that for all the tools that we give our law enforcement in Pennsylvania, the most important tool you need to have is trust with the community that you police.

And what the federal government is doing is eviscerating the trust with the American people.

And the Trump administration is making us all less safe.

This needs to end, and it needs to end now.

I think one of the critical things you just said there was about the sense of trust.

And obviously, you're never going to build trust with masked, unidentified, unaccountable, armed agents who shoot people in the street.

And then you are asked to call what they did a virtue, not just legal, not just allowable.

That was the right thing for them to do, that they are the heroes.

They are actually the victims of all of this.

Here's one reason why I think that they should be unmasked, or these men who evidently have been spirited out of Minnesota so they can't be identified.

Because until you identify them, you have to assume that every CBP officer is one of the guys who shot Alex Preddy.

That's not fair to the other people who work for Customs and Border Protection.

The guys are coming in, are stamping your passport.

It's just common sense that it's safer for everybody who works for these federal institutions to actually identify themselves.

It's not just for the knowledge of the public.

It's for the safety of the people who do this work so that they're not painted with the same brush.

And you are describing the policy that we employ for the Pennsylvania State Police and the policies that are used in most states, in most jurisdictions around this country.

We have very strict rules on when you can wear a mask, when you can be undercover.

Because part of the reason why you don't want someone masked, why you want them in a uniform, is because you want them to be identified as the folks in the community that are trusted to keep people safe, the people who are there to actually protect your constitutional rights.

And what this administration is doing, I fear, is undermining that trust that has been worked so hard to build up between law enforcement and the community, relying on these agents who are not trained, who are given a mission to go out and create havoc in our communities that is ultimately making us less safe and less free.

Every person, every Asian, any officer, an IS or CBP who attacks or kills an American and has then said, oh, no, they did the right thing.

That's only going to say to the next community that gets these agents sent in that this is going to happen to you.

So the rumor is that Philadelphia is on the list.

And as the governor of Pennsylvania, what are the options?

Because certainly governors of Illinois and governors of Minnesota and governors of California said, get out of here.

You have to have given this some thought.

What is the response, you believe of a governor now in the face of what is an attempt to foment fear?

We've given it a lot of consideration and we have spent hours and hours and hours doing, quite literally, tabletop exercises to prepare for it.

It is a sad day in America that a governor of a commonwealth needs to prepare for a federal onslaught where they would send troops in to undermine the freedoms and the constitutional rights of our citizens.

I want the good people of Pennsylvania to know, I want the American people to know that we will do everything in our power to protect them from the federal overreach.

There is such a thing as the 10th amendment.

I believe the federal government is violating that.

In Minnesota, we will stand tall and not allow them to violate it.

In Pennsylvania, we'll defend the people here and we will stand up to this federal overreach.

We're right back with more Governor Josh Shapiro, everybody.