Democrat Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) is warning his leftist colleagues that former President Donald Trump will be “strong” in Pennsylvania— a state Vice President Kamala Harris is eyeing to secure her win in the 2024 election.
While speaking to a crowd at the Atlantic Festival, Fetterman said Trump's influence in the state deepened after the first assassination attempt in July, saying the 45th president has a “special” place among Pennsylvania voters.
“Trump has created a special kind of a hold … and he’s remade the party, and he has a special kind of place in Pennsylvania,” Fetterman said, suggesting the race in his state is much closer than polls lead the country to believe. “I also want people to understand, you know, and it’s not science, but there is, there’s energy, and there’s kinds of anger on the ground in Pennsylvania, and people are very committed and strong. Trump is going to be strong, and … we have to respect that.”
Fetterman recalled the shocking moment in 2016 when Trump won Pennsylvania over twice-failed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. This was the first time a Republican presidential candidate had won the state since 1988.
During the 2016 election, Fetterman, a campaign surrogate for Clinton at the time, said he saw a warning that Trump was winning in the Keystone State.
“Everybody thought it was in the bag [for Clinton],” he said. “[But Trump’s] signs became like the state flower — you see them everywhere.”
.@SenFettermanPA breaks down his view of the ground game in the 2016, 2020, and 2024 elections—and how close the race between Harris and Trump is—in conversation with @TheAtlantic’s @JeffreyGoldberg.
— AtlanticLIVE (@AtlanticLIVE) September 19, 2024
Watch the full #TAF24 session: https://t.co/7Kc4LIQ2I8 pic.twitter.com/OGyaFrQdzc
When asked what he would tell Harris as she bets on winning Pennsylvania voters, the Senator suggested the vice president must campaign in front of voters and talk to them about their concerns—something she has thus failed to do.
Despite Fetterman previously breaking ties with Harris after she considered “withholding weapons or armaments to Israel,” he has publicly supported the vice president and her fight to defeat Trump in November.
Fetterman cited a New York Times poll that said Harris leads Trump by four percentage points in Pennsylvania, stressing that it will be a close race.
“When you have 25,000 people show up at a rally in Butler, I said that on social media, this is not a five-point race,” he said.