Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pennsylvania, is getting a first-hand look at President Donald Trump’s deal-making chops.
The senator has positioned himself as a voice of reason within his party, making it clear that he does not side with the radical, fringe voices that have made themselves at home among the Democrats. Republicans have welcomed his common-sense take on politics with open arms, and now the president is reportedly trying to make it official.
According to Politico’s Jonathan Martin, the plot to lure Fetterman away from the left is taking place behind the scenes, but that doesn’t mean it’s a secret.
“Trump has made the sell, offering his patented total and complete endorsement plus a financial windfall to the Pennsylvanian. A handful of Senate Republicans are also gently feeling out Fetterman and responding to his concerns over the prospect of defecting from the Democratic Party, multiple high-level GOP officials tell me,” the outlet reported.
But just because the senator is making friends across the aisle, including “Sen. Dave McCormick (R-Pa.), and his wife Dina, and Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.), and her husband, Wesley,” doesn’t mean he has any interest in joining the GOP.
“I’m not changing,” he said to Martin during a Friday interview. “I’m a Democrat, and I’m staying one.”
“I’d be a shitty Republican,” he added.
But Martin also reports that in private, Fetterman isn’t being as firm in his rejection.
“When one senior Republican recently brought up the idea of becoming an independent to Fetterman, he absorbed the suggestion and didn’t embrace or reject the overture, according to a GOP official familiar with the conversation,” he writes.
As for President Trump, sources appear to confirm that he’s interested in getting Fetterman on his side no matter what. When the senator sat down with Fox News’s Sean Hannity, the host revealed that he had received word from the president.
“‘Your job is to tell him: He’s gonna run as a Republican, he’s gonna have our full support, more money than he ever dreamed of, and he’s gonna win big,’” Hannity said of Trump’s instructions.
While he hasn’t yet officially responded to Trump’s offer, he noted that the Democrats don’t “mistreat” him, though they are less likely to engage freely with him due to his more center-of-the-road approach.
“They don’t mistreat me, but I think increasingly they’re suspicious or kinda standoffish,” he admitted.
It remains to be seen whether Democrats will drive Fetterman out of his own party, or if Republicans will eventually make him an offer he feels like he can’t refuse.
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Sierra Marlee is a millennial whose hunger for the truth in a world of fake news has led her to write. Marlee also contributes to BizPac Review.
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