GOP launches first attack on Fetterman

Senate Republicans’ campaign arm is launching its first televised attack ad Friday against John Fetterman, labeling him a far-left ally of Bernie Sanders.

The spot, which was shared exclusively with POLITICO, said the Pennsylvania Democratic Senate nominee “sided with socialists, backed a government takeover of health care” and “embraced parts of the Green New Deal that’d cost you 50,000 bucks a year.”

The 30-second ad by the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s independent expenditure also portrays a group of young people approaching a white van emblazoned with a Fetterman logo and pro-Sanders stickers.

“Left-wing radicals are rolling into Pennsylvania, pushing John Fetterman,” the narrator said, as the people take protest signs out of the van reading “End Fracking No More Oil,” "AOC is my Queen" and “Republican = Bigot.”

The commercial likewise highlights Sanders calling Fetterman an “outstanding progressive,” a line the Vermont senator used while campaigning for Fetterman in his successful 2018 run for lieutenant governor.

The NRSC said it is putting just under $1.5 million behind the ad from Friday through June 16 on broadcast and cable TV. A 15-second version of the spot will also run digitally.

Fetterman, who is recovering after suffering from a stroke last month, endorsed Sanders in his 2016 bid for the White House. In 2020, he did not back any Democratic candidate in the presidential primary.

Fetterman has said that he would back Medicare-for-All if the measure needed his vote to pass in the Senate.

As for the Green New Deal, the liberal proposal to tackle climate change, Fetterman has said that he supports pieces of it, such as creating union jobs to transition away from fossil fuels. But he opposes a ban on fracking, a method of extracting natural gas that employs tens of thousands of people in Pennsylvania.

That is a shift from his position during his unsuccessful 2016 Senate campaign, when Fetterman favored a moratorium on new fracking, though he said he supported easing it if an extraction tax and strict environmental regulations were implemented.

At a press conference Thursday, Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) said he would welcome a debate with Republicans about labels when asked about “socialist” attacks on Fetterman. Casey ripped into the GOP as “the party of QAnon, they're the party that accommodates white supremacy, and they genuflect to this former president day and night.”

In a statement, Fetterman spokesperson Joe Calvello called the new ad "laughable" and said, "John cannot be labeled because he is not like other politicians, and voters across Pennsylvania know that."

He also said the ad contained "inaccuracies," but did not provide specifics.

More than two weeks after the state’s May 17 primary, Pennsylvania’s Senate race is still in limbo. In addition to Fetterman being sidelined due to his health, a winner in the state’s Senate GOP primary has not yet been called.

State officials ordered that the race between celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz and former hedge fund CEO David McCormick go to a recount, which is automatically triggered if an election comes down to a half of a percentage point or less.

Both the Oz and McCormick campaigns said Thursday that just under 30 of the state’s 67 counties had completed their recounts.

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee began running digital videos this week attacking Oz as “a fake who endangers patients” and McCormick as a “Wall Street insider.”