HARRISBURG — Less than three months after wrapping up a bruising 135-day state budget standoff and facing a welter of ongoing financial concerns, Gov. Josh Shapiro will go before lawmakers Tuesday to deliver his annual budget address.

The stakes for Shapiro this year appear higher than ever. Widely seen as a potential presidential candidate — he’s made repeated national television appearances in the past week and just had a book published — the governor prides himself on “getting stuff done.” But the last budget process was a nasty 40-week political slog that went more than four months past deadline.

The state saw headlines about furloughs, schools borrowing money and counties planning layoffs. Domestic violence groups struggled. Health departments debated which services to put on hold.

Beyond that, Shapiro is seeking reelection this year. It's a midterm election cycle that could have big ramifications in Pennsylvania.

Not only is the governorship on the line, but every seat in the state House will be up for election, and Democrats currently have only a one-vote advantage. Republicans hold the Senate by a 27-23 count, but half the seats are up and at least some Democrats believe a flip is possible.

Democrats already are challenging in various Republican-held Senate districts, including the 6th in southeastern Pennsylvania, currently held by Sen. Frank Farry; the 24th in the same part of the state and currently held by Sen. Tracy Pennycuick; and the 40th in northeastern Pennsylvania, currently held by Sen. Rosemary Brown.

Conversely, Democratic Sen. Lindsey Williams of Allegheny County already has at least one announced Republican challenger in the 38th District — Thomas West, who ran unsuccessfully for Pittsburgh mayor last year.

The context for the budget speech by the Democratic governor on Tuesday will be the finances of a state that is spending billions more than it collects. And the chief steward of the state's money, Treasurer Stacy Garrity, is a gubernatorial candidate who has been endorsed by the state Republican Party and could be the opponent in Shapiro’s reelection bid this year.

In the Capitol, there is a sense that the last “budget season” just ended — because it did.

About a year ago, on Feb. 4, Shapiro unveiled a 2025-26 proposal with $51.5 billion in spending. The ensuing 40 weeks of hearings, discussions, start-and-stop progress, and accusations blew through the June 30 deadline — stopping billions of dollars in state payments — and did not end until the signing of a $50.09 billion deal Nov. 12.

The foul aftertaste of the impasse is not likely to have a big effect in state politics this year, according to Chris Borick, a pollster and political science professor at Muhlenberg College in Lehigh County. What last year’s debacle did do, he theorized, was validate “the general public viewpoint that government doesn't work very well.”

With Shapiro up for reelection, Republicans probably will not give him easy wins on the budget, Borick said. “I think they are going to try and push him hard in this cycle,” he said.

At the same time, his reelection bid may compel Shapiro to make deals to ensure there is no unfinished budget “hanging over him as an issue in the fall,” according to Borick.

Asked for comment on the upcoming address, Shapiro spokesman Alex Peterson said, “The governor will propose another balanced, fiscally responsible budget.” One need he is sure to address, Peterson said, is an action plan for housing issues.

Avoiding another lengthy impasse is a bipartisan desire.

“We are going to do our best to get out of town at the end of June,” said state Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward of Westmoreland County, a Republican.

Both she and Sen. Jay Costa of Allegheny County, the Senate Democratic minority leader, liked a series of face-to-face meetings involving all major players that happened at the end of the last year's budget marathon. Those meetings included leaders of each of the four legislative caucuses and Shapiro.

Ward sees benefits in trying to “continue where we left off.” For Costa, it would be a matter of learning from recent experience “how valuable face-to-face, five-party meetings are.”

In October, Shapiro had a 53%-43% lead in a “completely hypothetical” 2028 presidential contest in Pennsylvania that pitted him against current Vice President JD Vance, according to a Quinnipiac University poll.

In Ward’s opinion, the talk of a future presidential run is a major distraction for Shapiro.

“He has a national aspiration and that conflicts with what we need here in Pennsylvania,” she said. The time spent out of state, before cameras, is time not devoted to state issues, she said.

“He wants everybody to love him,” she said.

Polling shows the governor is popular in Pennsylvania. The same Quinnipiac survey of more than 1,500 Pennsylvania voters showed an approval rating of 60% for Shapiro, the highest number he had earned since the poll began tracking him. And a January poll from Bravo Group, a Harrisburg-based strategic communications firm, showed 57% of Pennsylvanians said they’d vote for him for governor if the election were held that day.

Pennsylvania’s financial numbers are less endearing. A recent Independent Fiscal Office review of the state’s General Fund found that a $3.65 billion deficit this year could balloon to more than $7.5 billion by 2029-30.

Costa, who in the past has questioned the reliability of some IFO numbers, said Shapiro could once again look to several sources for new revenue.

They might include the legalization of recreational marijuana and regulation of skill games.

A year ago, Shapiro projected pulling in more than $500 million in revenue from legalization. A legalization bill passed the House but was rejected by a Senate committee. Its prime sponsor, Democratic Rep. Rick Krajewski, of Philadelphia, said the move to “recklessly throw that bill in the trash bin” did not end possibilities of passing some form of his proposal.

“I am open to having conversations,” Krajewski said. Attacking one of the biggest criticisms of the bill — that it proposes using the state’s Liquor Control Board system to sell marijuana — Krajewski said studies have shown a state-store model would generate more revenue than selling through private stores.

The concept of regulating and deriving state revenue from the tens of thousands of skill games in convenience stores, bars, clubs and other venues has been around for years. Last year, Shapiro hoped to generate at least $350 million by turning that concept into law.

No bill got traction, though. Costa said it could happen this year.

A likely source of friction is the possible use of some of the $7.6 billion currently in the state's Rainy Day Fund. Some Republicans consider the fund untouchable. Many Democrats — including Costa — believe some of it should be put to use.

Among expenditures, the single largest source of discussion on a perennial basis is likely K-12 education. About three years have passed since a judge found Pennsylvania's education funding system to be unconstitutional, and each of the last two budgets have included at least $500 million in “adequacy funding” to bolster underfunded schools.

Recently, Shapiro said he plans to “keep building” on recent years’ education spending increases “to ensure every Pennsylvania student has the opportunity to success.”

Asked what Shapiro should prioritize on Tuesday, Allegheny County Republican Rep. Andrew Kuzma pointed to economic development. Done right, he said, it can negate the effects of rising prices on families.