More than two months have passed since Senator John Fetterman organized a public event in Pennsylvania, stopping at Pennsylvania Farm Show in January. Then in his schedule: appearing at a party in Pittsburgh to promote the up-to-date book of the Republican Senator Dave McCormick about mentoring – the latest show of Fetterman’s double -sidedness, which in his party copes with democrats.
“There are many people in all of Pennsylvania who are wondering if anyone is holding in all this?” said former rep. Conor Lamb, a democrat who lost to Fetterman in the basic democratic senate in 2022.
“And this is the work of John Fetterman. He should not only speak, he should listen to people, and instead it looks like he will listen to Dave McCormick and supporting the signing of Dave McCormick’s books.”
Lamb, a former prosecutor Marines, who is currently working at Kline & Specter, said that there are no direct plans to run for the office. For the first time he criticized his former opponent of the Senate in social media last weekend after Fetterman blew up a colleague from the democratic US representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., Ny) for suggesting that democrats should vote against the resolution by GOP in order to finance the government at the beginning of this month, getting to know the government. Ocasio-Cortez arranged, dividing the post lamb and saying that she Supported the wrong guy – Fetterman – in the original 2022. The moment was captured, like Democrats from Ocasio-Cortez on the left to Lamb or moderate, united frustration towards Fetterman and his recent republican genial attitude.
“He says the same about democrats for six months, we understand,” said Lamb. “Democrats know that we have some problems, but he has a job.
Fetterman’s office did not answer the request for comment.
“We just want to be heard”
The book event, the first common public performance with the participation of two senators in Pennsylvania, is advertised as a conversation between McCormick, Fetterman and their wives, Dina Powell and Gisele Fetterman, focused on improving mental programs for young people.
Tickets for the event are $ 32 and contain a copy of the book, Who believed in you ?, Written by Powell and McCormick. According to promotional materials, the book is to “start the national mentor movement” and contains interviews with the Governor Arkansas Sarah Huckabe Sanders, Maryland Governor Wes Moore and the former secretary of the state of Condozza Rice.
Pennsylvania is one of the States with a divided delegation of the Senate, and Fetterman and McCormick proudly advertised their genial working relationships – earlier Sitting together for an interview And eating with wives.
But without other public events from politicians and among national pressure on Republicans to organize the town hall, the chat of books attracts several progressive groups in Pennsylvania to protest.
“Nobody would be protesting against this book if the senators did their job and provide voters to participate in another forum,” said Dana Kellerman, veterinarian and member of Indivisible Pittsburgh. “We just want to be heard.”
Elaine Giaruso, a retired dentist and co-chairman of the Southwestern Pennsylvania Chapter Partners for Progress, also organizes a protest. Her group also joined the events “Mondays without McCormick”, calling on a republican legislator to directly involve his voters. “Only the idea for a public ticket event is almost a blow to the face in which you will meet with people who will pay you money, but you did not even hold the Tele-Miasta hall,” she said.
McCormick, who has just taken the office in January, publishes in social media about meetings with voters and holds Weekly coffee with invited Pennsylvanians in Washington. McCormicka spokesman said that he was in Pennsylvania “almost every weekend from the time of swearing”, he meets Pennsylvanians in his office every day and “plans to have regular Tele-Miasta.”
The conversation of the book with Fetterman was originally to be in the city vineyard in Pittsburgh, but the ads of this event no longer contain a place, simply exchanging in the center of Pittsburgh as a location.
Giaruso also He criticized Fetterman for his voting record This year he left 18 out of 91 votes.
Fetterman is one of the most famous senators of Pennsylvania he has ever had-but in recent months he spent little time with voters in the state. During the last break of the Senate, Fetterman, an ardent defender of Israel, traveled there on his second visit and met with the Prime Minister of Israel Benjamin Netanyahu.
Apart from the campaign of the former vice president of Kamali Harris, Fetterman has not appeared in Philadelphia for at least a year.
This absence contrasts Democrats, who in recent weeks have tried to use the town hall to Platform, which voters feel among President Donald Trump and the billionaire adviser Elon Musk for federal financing and employees. Senator Andy Kim (D., Nj) begged Town Hall in the town of Egg Harbor in a recently standing room “remain engaged”.
“Enough”
How The popularity of the democratic party has fallen and looking for a way forwardFetterman’s approach is a mystery. It presents a unique, and in recent years a popular perspective on how to reach the village and voters from the working class who leave the party on a fast clip.
But more and more often the desire of the first period to work with Trump and the support of Trump’s policy, along with his rejection of other democrats, irritates many would -be allies.
Matt Roan, chairman of Cumberland He called on Fetterman to resign in the recent Penn Live OP-ED This also blew up the senator because of the lack of public town halls.
“It’s enough. Fetterman no longer represents the interests of those who chose him,” said Roan. “It seems selfless serving in this critical position.”
Fetterman criticized the democratic panic surrounding Trump, considering The reality of the political situation with GOP under control. He stopped his party for trying to protest against Trump’s speech to Congress at the beginning of this month and called the vote against the budget resolution sponsored by GOP “a feat that would hurt millions and plunge us in chaos.”
“We maintained our open government. Coping with it,” wrote Fetterman in X Post, responding to Ocasio-Cortez.
The internal democratic survey, obtained by Inquirer, shows that Fetterman is positively perceived by 55% of the main voters in Pittsburgh and adversely for 41%.
AND Separate state survey of voters in Pennsylvania conducted by the Bravo Group showed that only 7% of voters in Pennsylvania “strongly” approves him.
But the polls also consistently show that most voters from Pennsylvania are ideologically considered to be ideologically and favors double -sided.
Lamb, which on Saturday is the town hall run by the County Democrats CenterHe said that for months he had avoided speaking in the hope that Fetterman’s kindness from GOP could bring results.
“It would be one thing if he used this double -sided property so that Trump would force Trump to pull out the shoes of social insurance recipients or veterans, but I don’t see John doing so,” said Lamb.
“This happens in the context of Donald Trump, who harms Pennsylvanian every day and it seems that we don’t hear much about it from John Fetterman.”
