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The Pennsylvania state capitol building.
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Pennsylvania’s Bipartisan Exchange Is Rebuilding Trust in Governance
Oct 29, 2026
The University of Pittsburgh Institute of Politics has nearly 40 years of experience working with legislators from different political parties, and it is building on this history by drawing on lessons from the successful American Congressional Exchange model, begun in 2018 at the Bipartisan Policy Center, and from state exchanges now underway in Minnesota and Michigan. The University of Pittsburgh Institute of Politics, in collaboration with the Bridge Alliance, has launched the Pennsylvania Legislative Exchange.
This state-based, systematic approach is designed to foster better relationships and build trust across the political aisle with the following guiding principles:
- Trust must be intentionally built between the two political parties before they can solve problems.
- Legislators must listen to one another and understand what motivates and concerns their colleagues.
- Shared experiences built on close personal interactions can bring state legislators together, help them identify shared values and goals, and find ways to work together for the common good.
When this happens, it almost always involves sharing information about each legislator’s perspective, their district’s challenges and opportunities, and a shared desire to make things work for all Pennsylvanians. The Pennsylvania Legislative Exchange (PLE) builds on this success and reinforces the idea that Pennsylvania benefits when we work together.
The PLE pairs legislators from opposite parties to visit each other's districts, focusing on districts that differ in geography, economy, culture, politics, and community demographics. The PLE aims to honor these differences, define common problems across communities, and identify shared interests and goals.
PLE trips typically last 12–36 hours, depending on the district’s geographic size. The Institute of Politics (IOP) designs itineraries in collaboration with the host legislator to showcase unique experiences, industries, businesses, institutions, and community leadership within the district. The trips will provide meaningful opportunities for local and county civic, business, education, and faith leaders to connect with the two members. Itineraries may include tours, roundtable conversations, meetings with local civic and community leaders, and shared meals to help legislators better understand a district's economic, social, political, and cultural makeup. The PLE will nurture authentic connections, bipartisan collegiality, and trust across differences.
The host legislator designs visits to reflect key challenges, opportunities, and constituent needs in their communities, and they exclude lobbying activity. Instead, visits are centered on relationship-building and introduction to each other’s district, with an eye toward potential future collaboration that grows organically from what is experienced on the
The Pennsylvania Exchange is built on a simple yet powerful premise: when lawmakers step outside the Capitol and into one another’s communities, they see the Commonwealth—and each other—with fresh eyes. Each bipartisan visit focuses on the issues that matter most to Pennsylvanians. By grounding itineraries in local, regional, and statewide policy concerns, participating legislators confront real challenges together and begin identifying solutions that can make a tangible difference back in Harrisburg.
These exchanges are uniquely valuable because of the diversity of the participants. Lawmakers come from regions shaped by distinct histories, industries, economies, and natural resources. As they travel across these varied landscapes, they gain a deeper appreciation for the perspectives that define Pennsylvania’s political and cultural mosaic. They discover not only the differences that shape their constituencies but also the unexpected commonalities that can form the basis for a shared purpose.
During each visit, policymakers hear directly from local leaders, residents, and stakeholders—voices often missing or overlooked in statewide debates. These conversations surface new priorities and reveal areas of alignment that transcend partisan politics. Participants often discover shared interests they didn’t know they had, along with policy ideas that emerge organically from Pennsylvanians' lived experiences.
By the end of each exchange, lawmakers return to Harrisburg with more than goodwill. They carry concrete ideas for legislative action—sparked by joint exploration, honest dialogue, and the recognition that durable solutions are possible when leaders see the Commonwealth through one another’s eyes. The Pennsylvania Exchange strengthens relationships, broadens understanding, and equips policymakers to craft bipartisan legislation grounded in the realities of the communities they serve.
David Nevins is the publisher of The Fulcrum and co-founder and board chairman of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund.
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NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani proposes five city-run grocery stores. See the arguments for and against, from food deserts to bodega concerns and the $70M cost.
Getty Images, Kwangmoozaa
Government-Owned Grocery Stores: Accessible Nutrition or Government Overreach?
Oct 22, 2026
Issue Introduction
Over the past few years, affordability has become the most central issue affecting Americans and the quality of life in the United States. The prices of groceries and basic necessities have risen 25-30% since the COVID-19 pandemic and are projected to rise another 3.2% in 2026. At the same time, the exodus of grocery chains from rural and low-income areas has scattered food deserts throughout individual states. Recent mass closures include Grocery Outlet’s shuttering of 36 stores and continued shut-downs of many Albertsons locations. These factors have led politicians to make affordability a major campaign issue.
During his progressive campaign for mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani raised the idea of opening grocery stores owned and operated by the city government to provide New Yorkers with affordable groceries. In his April 2026 public address that marked his first 100 days in office, Mayor Mamdani announced plans for the first of five city-run grocery stores. Mamdani’s proposed initiative will use $70 million in capital funding to build five city-owned municipal stores–one in each borough–and place them under control of the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC). NYCEDC will then select third-party operating staff in accordance with city standards for affordability and proper labor practices. Public opinion following the announcement continues to be divided between uproar and support.
The History of Government-Owned and -Assisted Grocery Stores
Several organizations and local governments have established grocery stores as a means of serving their communities. These efforts have had varying degrees of success, providing historical evidence of both benefits and difficulties of running such establishments.
Kansas State University’s Rural Grocery Initiative (RGI) is a research and community development program focused on sustaining grocery stores in rural communities. While RGI is not a government program, it uses state resources to support independent and locally-owned stores by providing management training, grant assistance, and other operational resources. RGI has provided assistance to several successful markets, such as St. Paul Market in rural southeastern Kansas. Baldwin Market in Baldwin, Florida was a city-run grocery store opened after the town’s only privately owned grocery store closed. Though it enjoyed initial success, it closed in 2024 because it lost more customers to other towns’ dollar stores and big-box grocers than it could recoup from sales revenue.
Arguments in Opposition: Industry and Political Resistance
Government-run grocery store initiatives face significant opposition from political figures and members of the grocery industry. Both groups’ arguments are based on economic evidence arguing that alternate methods of price easing will be less harmful and more effective in the long run. Owners of New York City’s bodegas and small markets share concerns that the initiative will let government stores undercut their businesses by offering prices that can’t be matched without compromising profitability. This is because their stores operate on tight margins and charge prices which are already lower than those of major grocery retailers. New York City members of the National Supermarket Association also fear that undercutting local markets will threaten the jobs of New Yorkers employed at those establishments. Their doubts are shared by the city council members voting on the funding allocation required to establish the stores.
Mamdani’s use of city-run grocery stores as a key tenet of his political agenda has drawn skepticism from strategists and policymakers who question whether Mamdani and his team understand the initiative’s true financial cost. They observe that the capital required to furnish the stores with proper supply chains and staffing might deter investment in private businesses and grow costlier over time as government administration of these functions makes day-to-day management more inefficient. These challenges lead them to argue that government power would be more effectively invested in subsidies or tax breaks that encourage stores to lower prices. This type of intervention has proven successful through its use in the Food Retail Expansion to Support Health (FRESH) program, which provides subsidies to grocers opening stores in food deserts. Supplementing existing initiatives would allow them to start faster and reach a greater number of city residents.
Arguments in Favor: Lowering Prices and Addressing Food Insecurity
Support for government-run grocery stores hinges on their ability to offer groceries at a lower price than traditional retailers. This is because the government does not have an interest in generating profit, and prices can be set to solely cover operating costs. Such practices are most typically observed in commissaries, government-run stores located on military bases. While only available to military affiliates, commissary stores ease financial strain on military members and families by offering necessities at a lower price. The Defense Commissary Agency (DCA)’s cost-plus model sets prices with a 5% surcharge to cover operating costs and lets shoppers pay 25-30% less at commissaries than they would at retail stores. Proponents of municipal grocery stores use this example to show that such savings can be achieved in civilian settings.
Government-run stores also draw support for their role in addressing food deserts, geographic regions lacking access to grocers and healthy food. More than two dozen New York City neighborhoods are considered food deserts and rely on bodegas as a major food source, providing residents with highly-processed food items as opposed to fresh produce and ingredients. This disparity is reinforced along lines of income. The ratio of bodegas to supermarkets in historically low-income neighborhoods–such as Brooklyn’s Sunset Park and Bedford-Stuyvesant–is 57:1, while high-income neighborhoods like Manhattan’s Upper West Side have a ratio as low as 3:1. City-operated grocery stores could diversify grocery options in low-income neighborhoods with limited supermarket access, offering fresh foods not often available at local stores.
Looking Forward
Mamdani must secure funding from the city council to move forward on developing the grocery stores. The council faces an imminent July 1 deadline to ratify its budget for the 2027 fiscal year, which currently includes the $70 million needed to cover all five store locations. If funding is acquired, development will begin at the two predetermined locations, La Marqueta in Manhattan and The Peninsula in the Bronx, as sites are selected for the stores in Queens, Brooklyn, and Staten Island. The Peninsula location is expected to be the first to open in 2027.
Conclusion
Mayor Mamdani’s proposal to provide New York City with five government-owned grocery stores is designed to provide healthier, more nutritious options to communities without traditional grocery retailers. While similar initiatives have been carried out in the past to varying degrees of success, providing consumers with lower prices and mitigating the negative effects of food deserts, worries persist about the government’s ability to manage the stores efficiently and the effects said stores might have on small businesses that cannot set competitive prices. The proposal has also drawn questions about whether supplementing existing nutrition programs would be more effective at reaching a greater number of New Yorkers. Debates over this program will likely continue until the July council meeting that decides whether it will receive funding.
Government-Owned Grocery Stores: Accessible Nutrition or Government Overreach? was originally published by The Alliance for Civic Engagement and is republished with permission.
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Harvard's Guy-Uriel Charles (left) listens to David Walker, Chair of the Federal Fiscal Sustainability Foundation. Fellow panelists (L-R) are Michael Farris, Convention of States Project; Samuel Fieldman, Wolf Pack; and Jim Rubens, FFSA and American Promise.
Photo by Martha Stewart
Congressional Inaction Raises Constitutional Change Alternative
Oct 21, 2026
Voting is the anchor of democracy, as we are reminded every two years. But this anchor rests on unstable ground today, signaling that our political roots need examining too.
In the United States, the Constitution itself becomes the focus when serious problems prompt such foundational civic dives. Our current challenges may not be as severe as the Civil War or the excesses of the Gilded Age, which produced waves of amendments, but today’s erosion of our system of checks and balances requires us to revisit our constitutional underpinnings.
The good news is that such work is underway. Amending the Constitution is the aim of numerous grassroots initiatives, from term limits and money in politics to fiscal responsibility. Influential books on constitutional change are multiplying. Law schools and universities are conducting model constitutional conventions and the like to supplement classroom activities and research.
Over the first weekend in October, a one-of-a-kind gathering of scholars, activists, students, and citizens from across the political spectrum met at Harvard Law School to confer about constitutional change. Their priorities and positions differed widely, but they shared an interest in the never-used method of considering and proposing amendments—a convention called by 34 state legislatures.
Article V of the Constitution describes (too briefly for some) two methods for proposing amendments—congressional voting and a state-initiated convention. They are equally valid. The Framers explicitly included the latter method to give the people a way to change our foundational law when Congress could not or would not vote out such proposals.
Harvard Law Professor Lawrence Lessig co-convened the VthePeople conference, noting that there is “growing recognition about the need for constitutional reform,” but that a “broken” Congress can’t help. He added that we need to “go back to the founding ideal of engaging in a process of constitutional craftsmanship” that is not left to congressional action or Supreme Court interpretation.
Conference participants heard from proponents and opponents of such a convention, as well as advocates of various amendment proposals. They also heard from international leaders whose countries have used citizen assemblies and public deliberative processes to strengthen their democratic decision-making. Their use in U.S. constitutional reform could address concerns about how such a convention might work since the Constitution itself is silent on convention rules, processes, or constraints. Assemblies could help select convention delegates, set the convention agenda, and inform how delegates vote.
A key fact that can allay concerns about a convention “going rogue” is that, like Congress, it can only propose amendments, which then must be ratified by 75% of the states. Even proposals to make amending the Constitution easier, such as by lowering the supermajority thresholds for both proposing and ratifying amendments (as emerged from the National Constitution Center’s own Drafting Project earlier this decade), would still have to earn the support of 38 states before taking effect. This external brake after the convention could also serve as an internal brake during it, as occurred at the inaugural Model Constitutional Convention at ASU in 2024.
An Article V convention would also help foster debate and deliberation among the public, a necessary but lengthy and messy part of producing constitutional change. Given that our political branches are proving incapable of tackling issues such as representational integrity and fiscal integrity, is the prospect of a convention not far-fetched? Or, if it becomes more realistic, would it prompt Congress to take up amendment proposals?
Lessig, who organized such a conference 15 years ago, was heartened by the participation of the international and citizen assembly leaders. “There are a lot of new things to think about.”
All this takes time. And it takes people working together. The National Constitution Center has launched its “civic decade” program to connect citizens to the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, all of which mark their 250th anniversaries this year, 2037, and 2041, respectively. Perhaps elevating repair of the Constitution can emerge during this window too.
VthePeople student organizer Billy Hasley summarized it well: “An Article V convention is another path to reforming our Constitution—maybe harder, but likely more durable, and certainly more democratic.” If enough of us do the work needed to make it happen or prompt Congress to fulfill its constitutional reform responsibility, he’ll be proven correct.
But start by voting. Then think about the ground we drop that anchor into.
Rick LaRue is a Fulcrum Contributor who writes about the Constitution, amendments, and electoral structure at structurematters.org. He served as deputy director of the Eisenhower Institute and of the American Society of International Law.
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U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth testifies during a Senate Committee on Appropriations hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on July 21, 2026. Hegseth is crafting a strong and masculine identity for his audience as he reportedly contemplates a presidential run.
(Alex Wroblewski/AFP/Getty Images/TNS)
Politicians Can’t Just ’Give the People What They Want’
Oct 16, 2026
For reasons that will baffle my many detractors, I am often asked for advice about being an opinion journalist. One of my standard responses is: You have to be willing to disappoint your biggest fans.
What I mean is that if you start to see your job as telling fans what they want to hear, you risk becoming an entertainer rather than a thinker, and eventually you become a caricature. I’ve seen it happen numerous times. Patrick Buchanan was a brilliant columnist and a serious person. But over the course of his career, he listened too much to the people who said, “Go Pat, go!” and too little to friends who said, “I think that’s taking it too far.”
In journalism — or what passes for it — you can see the same arc most acutely in talk radio and TV hosts, who define their roles as telling the audience what it wants to hear rather than what it needs to hear. In the early Trump era, many prominent pundits were fairly conventional conservatives. When the audience veered towards populism and MAGA, the hosts followed the advice widely attributed to the French 19th century politician, Alexandre Auguste Ledru-Rollin: “There go the people, I must follow them, for I am their leader.” (In fairness, he didn’t say it, critics ascribed it to him.)
But the most dangerous realm for this dynamic isn’t political journalism. It’s politics. Politicians often are captured by their true-believing base. It’s most commonly seen among “conviction” politicians, who make a name for themselves on a single issue or idea. Congressman and Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan’s deep populist support was enough to earn him the Democratic nomination three times (1896, 1900 and 1908), but his support wasn’t wide enough to ever win.
Segregationists like George Wallace, socialists like Norman Thomas, and even Buchanan himself offer similar examples of the problem. Sarah Palin, Bernie Sanders, Kari Lake and Ron Paul provide more recent cautionary tales.
One of the key problems is ego. Politicians see huge crowds or read favorable media coverage and assume their people are the people. In the U.K., socialist Labor politician Jeremy Corbyn was wildly popular among people who liked Jeremy Corbyn. He brought his superfans into the party, but his superfans didn’t represent the broader electorate or even the traditional rank and file who fled the party in droves.
At a campaign event for Lake’s 2022 bid for an Arizona U.S. Senate seat, she asked the crowd, “We don’t have any McCain Republicans in here, do we? All right, get the hell out.” John McCain was one of the most dominant political figures in Arizona, winning six back-to-back Senate elections. Thinking that she didn’t need support from Republicans, or the Democrats and independents who voted for McCain, was a pristine example of mistaking intensity of support for quantity of support.
But I started with journalism to illustrate a point. Jesse Watters, a reliable water-carrier for President Trump, is Fox News’ most popular prime-time host, averaging about 2.7 million viewers per night. That means on any given night, roughly 346 million Americans aren’t watching. But if you’re Trump, you might think Watters is representative of the American people.
Now Watters’ audience does matter, not least because GOP primary voters and small donors are undoubtedly more likely to watch. And because of idiotic “reforms” to our system, many politicians now care more about the primary electorate than the general electorate, because the greatest threat to incumbency is in party primaries. Also, primaries are what matter for the nomination.
The result: Politicians orient themselves to small, intense slices of the electorate. This polarizing dynamic is further intensified by social media. Politicians and activists mistake the “vibes” of X and TikTok for the real world. They become intensely “online” and responsive to the feedback they’re fed by social media algorithms.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth recently told Jack Posobiec, the exceedingly online conspiracy theorist and right-wing troll, that the Pentagon would livestream the execution by firing squad of Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood shooter. I have no issue with Hasan being executed, but a livestreamed execution of a man in a wheelchair is grotesque. Hegseth, who is reportedly contemplating a presidential run, cares about appearing strong and manly to Posobiec and his audience. Posobiec, if you didn’t know, is an open superfan of Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, hosting “Franco Fridays” on his podcast.
It seems that Hegseth’s pandering to a tiny sliver of the electorate won’t yield a political snuff film. Even Trump and JD Vance are leery of the idea.
But, who knows, maybe if Watters starts pushing it, they’ll change their minds.
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.
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