{"id":223754,"date":"2026-09-11T01:06:26","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T01:06:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/democrat-john-fetterman-makes-surprise-appearance-at-republican-convention-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T01:06:26","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T01:06:26","slug":"democrat-john-fetterman-makes-surprise-appearance-at-republican-convention-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/democrat-john-fetterman-makes-surprise-appearance-at-republican-convention-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"Democrat John Fetterman makes surprise appearance at Republican convention – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Senator praises \u2018great friend\u2019 Dave McCormick and says he will help him and Trump to support steel in Pennsylvania
The Democratic senator John Fetterman made a surprise virtual appearance at the Republican midterm convention, delivering a video address supporting Dave McCormick, a Republican senator in Pennsylvania<\/a>.
Fetterman, who has increasingly broken with his party since his election in 2022, said in the video that he would always reject \u201cextremes and socialism\u201d, repeating an oft-used Republican critique of the Democratic party\u2019s increasingly popular left wing.
The video message will do little to dampen speculation that the renegade senator, who is now more popular<\/a> among Republican voters in Pennsylvania than the Democrats who helped elect him, is preparing to switch political parties. Fetterman has repeatedly said that is not his plan, though he recently suggested he would be forced to formally break with the Democratic party if it ever became \u201cthe anti-Israel party\u201d.
Democrats currently hold 47 seats in the US Senate<\/a>. Despite the long odds, Democrats believe discontent with the economy and Trump\u2019s low approval ratings have given them a rare opportunity to retake control of the upper chamber. A defection would jeopardize their already narrow path to a majority.
Yet if Fetterman remains a Democrat, he would hold outsized influence, effectively wielding veto power in a 51-49 majority.
In the roughly one-minute video, Fetterman, wearing his trademark black hoodie, stood outside the Mon Valley Works \u2013 a processing plant operated by US Steel in Pittsburgh. In a stunning display of support for a Republican colleague in the Senate, Fetterman called McCormick his \u201cgreat friend\u201d, and said that he would work with him and Donald Trump<\/a> \u201cto fight and defend the steel way of life\u201d.
\u201cYes, I\u2019m a Democrat. Why am I here talking to you today? Because, well, I\u2019m a commonsense Democrat. I\u2019m always going to stand with America,\u201d the Pennsylvania lawmaker said in the pre-recorded message. \u201cI\u2019m always going to reject the extremes and socialism and that anti-American way of life. Dave McCormick is the kind of senator that gets the job done, and he\u2019s going to fight for Pennsylvania.\u201d
At the convention center in Dallas, attenders welcomed the senator\u2019s rightward march.
\u201cI actually think it\u2019s really awesome that he\u2019s come around,\u201d Tracy Smith, an attender from Maryland, said. \u201cHe\u2019s more commonsense, and even though he\u2019s a Democrat, he can see both sides. You have to get along. It\u2019s like a seesaw. You know, not right or left, but in the middle. And I think he realized that, and it\u2019s actually amazing.\u201d
Asked if she thought Fetterman could switch to the Republican party, Smith said: \u201cI actually do. I think he\u2019s leaning that way right here. It would be great. I think it would be awesome.\u201d
Eric Torrison, who traveled from Arizona to attend the convention, was also laudatory.
\u201cThere is no way on God\u2019s green Earth that I would have supported Fetterman when he ran for the Senate, and [was] aghast when he got elected,\u201d said Eric Torrison, who lives in Arizona.
\u201cBut it\u2019s really interesting. He seems to have held to his beliefs, and not run to the left, and he seems to be, from a conservative standpoint, from a Republican standpoint, the only sensible Democrat there.\u201d
Fetterman\u2019s fellow Democrats were far less charitable. \u201cJohn Fetterman is the laziest Benedict Arnold America has ever seen. He didn\u2019t even have it in him to get off his couch in his million-dollar penthouse to kiss Donald Trump\u2019s ring in person. He phoned it in, just as he has every day as our senator. John should do his job or resign,\u201d the Pennsylvania state representative Malcolm Kenyatta said in a statement.
Fetterman has been in the limelight after reports<\/a> from current and former staff that he was avoiding constituent events, behaving erratically and cozying up to conservative media.
In the past week, the senator has attempted to defend himself after an account on X<\/a>, which claims to be run by former staffers, gained traction.<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Senator praises \u2018great friend\u2019 Dave McCormick and says he will help him and Trump to support steel in PennsylvaniaThe Democratic senator John Fetterman made a surprise virtual appearance at the Republican midterm convention, delivering a video address supporting Dave McCormick, a Republican senator in Pennsylvania.Fetterman, who has increasingly broken with his party since his election […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":223755,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-223754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/223755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}