A 38-year-old male has been taken into custody for a blaze at the home of the Pennsylvania governor when the governor and his family were sleeping within. Harrisburg Bureau of Fire was called to the fire about 2 a.m. and put it out, but the structure was left with “a considerable amount of damage,” Pennsylvania State Police said.
Gov. Josh Shapiro reported that he, his wife, their four children, two dogs and another family were evacuated safely. Cody Balmer of Harrisburg was arrested Sunday, state police commissioner Col. Christopher Paris said at an afternoon news conference.
Balmer has not been charged yet, but Dauphin County District Attorney Fran Chardo announced that he would charge him with attempted murder, terrorism, aggravated arson and aggravated assault on a listed person. The suspect also might face charges at the federal level, according to Chardo. Balmer also possessed some “homemade incendiary devices,” according to Bivens. The attack was “targeted”, but a definitive motive remains to be determined, Shapiro added.
Balmer’s arrest comes days before he’s due in court for a plea hearing on a different case arising from a 2023 simple assault charge, state court records indicate. In another case, Balmer pleaded guilty in 2016 to theft by deception and forgery charges, court records indicate.
Images of the scene reveal part of the building gutted by the fire, with furniture burned and covered in ash on the floor. Images also reveal the walls and ceiling blackened and include some leftover remnants of the Passover dinner the governor attended Saturday night, such as a “Passover Crafts” sign.
Democratic officeholders have confronted an influx of violent threats over the last several years – from a kidnapping plot against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2023, through death threats sent to election officials in Georgia, to two attempted assassination plots last year against President Donald Trump.
Balmer crossed over a fence around the house and “forcibly entered” the residence before igniting the fire, Chardo said. He was in the governor’s residence for under a minute and “actively evaded” troopers who were looking for him at the same time, Lt. Col. George Bivens of the Pennsylvania State Police said.
“He obviously had a plan,” he added.
“He was very methodical in the way he went about it.”
The governor added that he refused to be “deterred” in his job.
“If this man was attempting to deter me from performing my duties as your governor, I assure you, I will somehow manage to work all the harder than I was,”
he said.
Shapiro also spoke of his pride in his Jewish religion.
“If he was attempting to terrorize our family, our friends, the Jewish people, who dined with us for a Passover Seder in that room last night, listen to me on this: we celebrated our faith last night, proudly and in a few hours, we will celebrate our second Seder of Passover,”
he noted.
No one will discourage me, or my family, or any Pennsylvanian from expressing their faith freely and proudly.
There is a security review underway “to figure out how we can make sure that we don’t have a repeat of something like this,” Bivens said. Shapiro expressed that he had “total confidence in the Pennsylvania State Police.” The FBI’s Philadelphia field office is also helping state police with its investigation, the agency added.
Shapiro described the fire as an assault not only on his family but on “the entire Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.” “I’m not afraid,” he said. “I’m obviously upset, concerned about my family. I want my children to be fine.
