John Fetterman may be the most surprising comeback story in modern politics. He defeated a so-called moderate in Conor Lamb to win the Democrat senatorial nomination in Pennsylvania three years ago, just as he suffered a major stroke. He refused to back out of the election and defeated GOP nominee Mehmet Oz to win his seat in the US Senate. Fetterman battled his way back to health, only to then spend the next two years battling his own party's sharp turn toward radicalism, especially in regard to Israel, terrorism, and now socialism.
You simply cannot do all of that without integrity, as well as an innate sense of optimism. Fetterman shows both in this exchange with Jesse Watters from last night, but his optimism is clearly misplaced when it comes to the Democrat Party. As all of the signals on the direction of his party turn the same color as Mao's little book, Fetterman insists that socialism does not represent the party's mainstream:
🚨 Q: Will you SWITCH to Republican if socialism takes over the Democrat Party?
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) November 4, 2025
SEN. JOHN FETTERMAN: No. Socialism isn't taking over the Democratic Party. NYC's politics are NOT a national model.
Hate to break it to you, John. Socialism is taking over your party. pic.twitter.com/KbIjBOMUzm
Ahem. This is not just "New York City's politics." It's also the politics in Los Angeles, Chicago, Portland (OR), Seattle, Minneapolis, and other urban cores. Socialism has become the mainstream of Democrat politics and policies over the past couple of decades at least, largely driven by foreign money infiltrating both political orgs and Academia, as I wrote yesterday at length for our VIP members.
It's not just the cities, either. Fetterman is practically alone in the Senate caucus, and few moderates exist in the House Democrat caucus, too. Those who still do have faced primary fights funded by radical Leftists, such as Henry Cuellar, who barely survived challenges to his southern Texas seat after begging Joe Biden to stop the flood of illegal aliens across the southern border. In the last open presidential primary for his party, Biden was the only traditional Democrat on stage, where most of the others positioned themselves on the Bernie Sanders wing. Biden picked Kamala Harris as a promise to the socialist wing of a graceful transfer of leadership to their cadre at the end of his presidency.
Fetterman is fooling himself. He's not lying about this; rather, Fetterman simply has too much loyalty to see where his party is not only going, but largely has already arrived. He's so far outside the mainstream of the Democrat Party that he no longer gets interview requests from MSNBC, Fetterman told the Daily Wire, in what should be a wake-up call about who and where the party's fringe actually is:
It’s not just that Fetterman doesn’t understand some of the positions his colleagues have taken — though, to be sure, he doesn’t — but that he literally doesn’t know what they’re thinking. And how could he? They won’t talk to him.
“Not a single Democrat reached out to me,” Fetterman said about the lack of response to his Sunday appearance on CNN’s State of the Union with Jake Tapper, during which he said that Democrats “need to own the shutdown.” ...
So, has the Gentleman from Pennsylvania heard from the Senate Minority Leader?
“I haven’t,” Fetterman says.
Such is life for the self-proclaimed “regular Democrat,” whose refusal to toe the party line has made him a bit of a loner on his side of the aisle.
“I mean, honestly, I’m on The Daily Wire having this conversation,” Fetterman says with just a hint of incredulity. “I’m not having this conversation on MSNBC because they haven’t — I’d be happy to have this conversation there.”
His party won't talk to him. His party leadership won't talk to him. MSNBC won't talk to him, despite being desperate for intelligent content.
Fetterman's loyalty and optimism are laudable, but only insofar as they don't cross over into sheer delusion. Fetterman believes in a Democrat Party that has been dead for about two decades everywhere it matters, including and especially at the national level. The swooning over socialists like Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and now Zohran Mamdani is not merely a Big Apple phenomenon, but a national shift to hard-Left radicalism by a party hollowed out by socialists in FDR's clothing. If Fetterman wants to rescue his party from the Red Brigades, he'd better snap out of it soon and start working to pull it back from the brink ... or rethink his loyalty to a party that only exists in name.
Whichever Fetterman chooses, we can at least be grateful for his integrity. We may not often agree with him, but he's one of the most honest politicians to emerge in this era.
Editor’s Note: Zohran Mamdani is an avowed Democratic Socialist and has a real chance to become the next mayor of New York City.
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