1 hour ago
2
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., who has broken with far-left Democrats numerous times, spoke out on Tuesday’s episode of the “Impaulsive” podcast about how his party needs to change its strategy.
Fetterman lamented the modern state of politics as a polarized mess between two parties engaged in a “race to the bottom.” He, however, made the case that he is working to serve Americans as a Democratic Party senator in a state that ultimately voted for President Donald Trump’s reelection in 2024.
“Some Democrats now are actually running on the ‘f— Trump’ – I mean literally, that’s in some of their commercials, you know, honestly,” he said.
He went on to criticize the idea of tarring one’s political opposition as “fascists,” warning, “And this idea — and if you call someone on their side as, like, ‘they’re fascists,’ then that means that people that I know, and I love that voted for him, you know, that must be — they are fascists. And they are not. These are good people. They love our country no less than they do. It’s just having different views and, you know, trying to find a way forward in a deeply divided country.”
“I refuse to do that,” he said of political tribalism and name-calling. “People forgot that we’re all Americans, and we actually need each other.”
He went on to recall how he “took so much s—” for being invited to dinner with Trump in 2025.
“I was excited. I was like, ‘Hey, great. We have an invitation. Sure. I can’t wait. This will be great.’ You know, I love to have conversations,” Fetterman said.
This bipartisan outreach from Trump, he said, has no equivalent in the Democratic Party.
“There’s no Democrats reaching across the aisle right now,” he said, summarizing the Democrats’ messaging as: “You want to pay your bills, F— Trump, and burn it down.”
The reality, he said, is more complicated, in that “I don’t just represent, you know, Democrats. I represent all 13 million Pennsylvanians.”
Toward the end of the episode, he concluded by calling for a better level of political discourse.
“The Democrats are angry at me because, more and more, the Democratic Party, the base, really wants more ‘F— Trump’ kind of a thing,” he said. “So, my votes are — my values are reflected in the votes. But overall, I’ll be an example that can people say, ‘Well, at least they’ll do it in a respectful way’ and be a reasonable or a common-sense thing in the middle of the insanity here.”
English (US)