🤺 Josh Shapiro says the 2028 presidential race should be a once-in-a-generation battle over the Democratic Party's core identity. But so far, he isn't picking up his sword to fight.

• ☺️ As progressives and socialists have won primary after primary in recent weeks, the more moderate Shapiro often has been gun-shy about criticizing the left, taking more of a we're-all-in-this-together approach.

Why it matters: Many center-left Democrats are looking for a national leader to go toe to toe with the party's rising socialist wing. For now at least, that's not Shapiro.

• ⚠️ The potential 2028 contender's restraint underscores a defining trait: He picks his spots and rarely acts impulsively.
• His moves also suggest he doesn't want to completely alienate the left. He's sought to court progressives at times — implicitly acknowledging the movement's growing power.

Driving the news: Shapiro repeatedly has said that Democrats need to have an ideological clash as they did in 1992, when they nominated Bill Clinton, a Southern moderate who went on to defeat President George H.W. Bush.

• 📺 "What our party has to go through that will be very healthy, and something we've not really done since the 1992 election cycle, is to have a battle over what we believe in," Shapiro told CNN's Dana Bash recently.
• He made the same argument in an interview with Politico's Jonathan Martin, saying, "We are now poised as a party to have what we haven't really had for the last 30 years, and that is a big ideological debate," noting, "the last time our party had a big ideological battle … was 1992."

Flashback: Before he ran for president, Clinton as Arkansas' governor picked fights with powerful groups on the left, including organized labor, environmental groups, teachers and other activists.

Zoom in: As much as Shapiro sounds as if he's itching for a fight, he's often pulling punches.

• 🗳️ This month, he struck a positive note on MS Now's "Morning Joe" when asked about democratic socialists romping in recent primaries.
• "A through-line is that there is real passion in the electorate" to "elect people who can be a check on Donald Trump's chaos and cruelty and corruption," Shapiro said.
• He added that voters have "a lot of pain inflicted by this president and his enablers ripping away health care here in Pennsylvania from a half a million people, ripping away food assistance."

Shapiro, 53, has resisted reporters' efforts to identify him as either a "moderate" or "progressive."

• Democrats eventually "have to coalesce around policies that maybe aren't left-wing or center or center-left or whatever — it's a little piece of lots of different things," he said on "The Press Box" podcast.
• After interviewing Shapiro, "Press Box" host Joel Anderson said Shapiro is "not going to get dragged into dissing like the Mamdani wing of the Democrats. I think that's an … older type of politician that is going to be lashing out."

Shapiro's posture is markedly different from more combative moderates in his party such as New Jersey Rep. Josh Gottheimer, whose response to democratic socialists' recent victories has been to call them frauds: "If you're a socialist, you're not a Democrat."

Yes, but: There are times when Shapiro does distance himself from parts of the left.

• He's said he has "profound differences" with Darializa Avila Chevalier, a democratic socialist who ousted Rep. Adriano Espaillat in New York's Democratic primary.
• Shapiro also has said that "people who want open borders and no prisons and no police — they're wrong."
• But that's a bit of a straw-man argument — virtually no elected officials are talking about defunding the police anymore, not even socialist leaders.

Between the lines: Shapiro's centrist identity is no secret: He is pro-school vouchers, supports an "all of the above" energy policy, and brags about cutting taxes.

• But he's tried to find common ground with progressives. He talks regularly with Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, sued an AI company, and put his political muscle behind a Bernie Sanders–backed union leader running for a key House seat.

The other side: Matt Bennett, a former Clinton aide and co-founder of the center-left group Third Way, said it's just a matter of timing.

• "People like Shapiro will articulate very sharp differences with the DSA and the rest of the extreme left. But they probably won't do that until they are fully into a presidential primary."

What they're saying: "Gov. Shapiro has been clear that with a president and a Congress hurting Pennsylvania families and attacking our democracy, no one should take their eye off the task of winning in 2026," Shapiro spokesperson Manuel Bonder said.

Read more.

— Holly Otterbein, Alex Thompson

A look at what potential 2028 Democratic presidential contenders are up to:

• 🇮🇱 Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel gave a blunt speech criticizing the current Israeli government at Tel Aviv University on Wednesday. "Your government is complicit in the horrors now being inflicted on innocent families in the West Bank," he said. "That undermines your international legitimacy, as a small nation, at a time when you can least afford it." (Watch it here.)
• 🐎 Al Sharpton, founder of the National Action Network civil rights organization, had high praise for Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear as a potential 2028 presidential contender. He told Axios' Delano Massey and Russell Contreras that Beshear gave off "Clinton '92" vibes and wowed Black voters at NAN's convention in April.
• 🤷🏻‍♀️ Asked if former Vice President Kamala Harris should run again, Sharpton described her situation as a "six on one hand, half-dozen on the other" scenario. He acknowledged frustration with her loss in 2024 but said she can't be counted out for 2028.
• 🦞 Harris also shared more details about a New Orleans trip we scooped, announcing she'll be the guest of honor next month at the Louisiana Democratic Party's Masquerade Sneaker Ball.
• New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will rally with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in Michigan next weekend to support Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed — a follow-up to the joint appearances AOC and Sanders made last year as part of Sanders' "Fight Oligarchy" tour.
• 🌽 Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg speaks at the Iowa Democratic Party's annual Liberty and Justice Celebration tonight.
• 🦀 Maryland Gov. Wes Moore is heading to South Carolina tomorrow to campaign with various Democratic candidates in the Lowcountry and the Midlands. Moore also will speak at the convention for the American Federation of Teachers this week in D.C.
• California Gov. Gavin Newsom campaigned in Nevada yesterday with Rep. Steven Horsford and gubernatorial candidate Aaron Ford. Newsom told reporters he'd be campaigning for other Democrats through November, with a particular focus on the South and voting rights.
• California Rep. Ro Khanna, a critic of Israel's actions in Gaza, traveled Wednesday to a small Palestinian village on the West Bank and was temporarily blocked from leaving by Israeli settlers and soldiers.

🤓 Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly is a bit of a nerd about space, and who can blame him?

• 🧑‍🚀 The former astronaut has spent more than 50 days in space and orbited the Earth 854 times, according to NASA.
• Kelly also likes space movies — and recently revealed his Top 3 on social media.

👽 He said his favorite, "without a doubt," is 2015's "The Martian," starring Matt Damon as an astronaut trying to survive after being stranded on Mars.

• "It's really an engineering, problem-solving movie," he said. "It felt very real to me … with maybe the exception of the crew referring to the boss, the commander of the mission, as Commander Lewis. That's actually not how that works. You're very close to your crew members and it's very informal."

🌌 He listed 2014's "Interstellar" as his second favorite, particularly because of the "physics involved," including issues such as "time dilation" and how time is affected when astronauts are in a "deeper gravity well."

• He notes that because his twin, Scott, a fellow astronaut, was in space longer, Kelly is now about 13 milliseconds older than his brother than when they were born.
• Kelly named this year's "Project Hail Mary" as his third-favorite space movie. It started slow, he said, but was compelling by the end.

— Alex Thompson