Fetterman Praises GOP Colleague at Republican Convention, Won't Say What He'd Do as a 51st Senate Vote

Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman keeps saying he's a Democrat. His actions keep making Republicans wonder if that's still true.

At the Texas Tribune Festival in Austin on Saturday, Sept. 26, CBS News' Major Garrett pressed Fetterman on whether he'd bolt the party. Fetterman called a Democratic Senate majority "entirely possible" this November and admitted he might be the deciding 51st vote. Asked what he'd do with that power, he punted: "Let's revisit after the midterms, and let's see what happens... I don't know."

He also fumbled the question live. Asked why he won't register as an independent given his breaks with Democrats, Fetterman blurted, "Because I'm a lifelong Republican" before catching himself and correcting to "lifelong Democrat," joking that the slip would "get clipped."

The Dallas cameo that started it

The speculation didn't start in Austin. Earlier this month, Fetterman appeared by video at the Republican National Committee's midterm convention in Dallas, introducing Pennsylvania GOP Sen. Dave McCormick as a "great American" and "great friend." He called himself a "commonsense Democrat" who rejects "socialism" and pledged to work with President Trump on steel industry policy, according to Fox News and the Daily Wire.

"Yes, he's in a different party," Fetterman said of McCormick, "but I'm proud to count him as my great friend." McCormick said he was "grateful."

In a statement to Fox News Digital afterward, Fetterman drew a line: "I'm a lifelong Democrat who votes overwhelmingly with my party — and should the Senate flip in November, I will still be the 51st vote that I ran on."

He hasn't voted to organize the Senate with Republicans, hasn't caucused with the GOP, and says explicitly he'd deliver a Democratic majority its deciding vote if Democrats win in November. On paper, that's a real commitment, not just rhetoric.

But the record cuts the other way

Heritage Action, the conservative advocacy group, gives Fetterman a 0% score for the 119th Congress and a 4% lifetime score. Meaning by their measure he votes with the conservative position almost never on their tracked bills. That points away from any real GOP alignment on policy substance, even as he breaks from Democrats on specific fights.

Those breaks are real and repeated: Fetterman voted against Iran war powers resolutions, opposed cutting off aid to Israel, backed Trump's nomination of Markwayne Mullin, and sided with Republicans to end last fall's government shutdown, according to the Daily Wire and the Hill. He's said publicly that if Democrats become what he calls an "anti-Israel party," he would leave.

A July Quinnipiac poll found 77% of Pennsylvania Republicans approve of Fetterman's job performance, versus just 19% of Democrats. 52% of Pennsylvania voters told pollsters they'd like to see him leave the Democratic Party, according to the Daily Signal. Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Utah Sen. Mike Lee have both publicly said they'd welcome him into the Republican conference.

Democrats are done waiting to find out

Pennsylvania Democrats aren't sitting still. CNN reported that party leaders are already lining up a 2028 primary challenger regardless of whether Fetterman runs again, with Pittsburgh-area Rep. Chris Deluzio emerging as a consensus favorite who's drawn support from both Gov. Josh Shapiro's circle and Sen. Bernie Sanders. Reps. Brendan Boyle and Madeleine Dean, Lt. Gov. Austin Davis, and former Rep. Conor Lamb are also floated as possible challengers, per CNN.

The reaction to the Dallas video was blunt. Boyle called Fetterman "Trump's favorite Democrat." Lamb told the New York Times the video had "all the persuasiveness of a North Korean newscast." Rep. Sarah McBride compared it to "boarding the Titanic after it hit the iceberg." Dean told C-SPAN, "He lost me last night with that stunt."

CNN also reported that Senate Democrats are privately exhausted with Fetterman. He skips most weekly caucus lunches and committee hearings, and his staff turnover is high enough that colleagues don't know who to call in his office. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer hosted him for a dinner last month, an attempt at damage control that CNN frames as driven partly by fear he could switch parties and hand Republicans a working majority.

Fetterman himself won't answer whether he'd actually cast that 51st vote for Democratic priorities if the majority comes down to him, or whether "revisit after the midterms" means something else entirely. Pennsylvania voters, and his own party's Senate leadership, will find out only after Election Day.