This week’s biggest Winners & Losers

Twenty commonwealth Democrats started their week with some very good news: Their popular and increasingly high-profile governor announced he was endorsing 20 state House candidates ahead of the November election. The thumbs-up took some candidates by happy surprise – and showed how invested Gov. Josh Shapiro is in growing his party's state House majority – one of the keys to his legislative agenda.

The state’s system of higher education is taking a hit early this semester. PASSHE Chancellor Daniel Greenstein, who had announced his impending departure in July, will be leaving for the private sector in October to join Baker Tilly, an international accounting and advisory firm that does a lot of work in the higher education sector. Greenstein oversaw the state system’s merger of six universities into two and recent efforts to secure more state funding for PASSHE.

Berks County native Taylor Swift made waves this week when she endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris just moments after the conclusion of Harris’ presidential debate with former President Donald Trump. Swift’s Instagram post motivated more than 337,000 people to go to a voter registration website – just the latest example of how the self-professed “childless cat lady” is the biggest Reading-born pop celebrity around. 

One of the commonwealth’s largest health systems has reached a settlement over data breaches of medical records. Lehigh Valley Health Network will pay out $65 million in a class-action lawsuit that involved a data breach of medical records of more than 134,000 patients. LVHN said the incident was a result of a cybersecurity attack by the ransomware gang known as BlackCat, believed to be associated with Russia.

After months of being bested in fundraising by her Republican opponent, U.S. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, Democratic congressional candidate Ashley Ehasz is slipping in a recent poll – which this week shows the GOP incumbent with a 14-point advantage over his Bucks County challenger. The Fitzpatrick campaign’s internal polling also reveals an even larger lead over Ehasz, a U.S. Army veteran, among the independent voters who may well determine the race. 

After making numerous appearances in Pennsylvania over the past year in the aftermath of a train derailment along Pennsylvania’s border with Ohio, the head of railroad operator Norfolk Southern has seen his career derailed by a romantic relationship. According to the company, President and CEO Alan Shaw was terminated by the railroad’s board of directors after an investigation revealed he had a consensual relationship with the company’s chief legal officer. Talk about off the rails.