Fetterman unpacks Pennsylvania days before the election
“We all understand Pennsylvania is going to pick the president," the senator said. Mia McCarthy 11/03/2024, 10:47am ET
Two days until Election Day, Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) dished his thoughts on his home state of Pennsylvania — and how it will decide the winner of the 2024 presidential race.
“It’s undeniable that there's strong energy on both sides. It’s going to be close.
I'm not surprised to hear that Harris will spend a lot more time in Pennsylvania before the election,” Fetterman said Sunday to Dana Bash on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We all understand Pennsylvania is going to pick the president."
The Democratic Pennsylvania senator said he believes Harris will win Pennsylvania, but knows it will be a close race like it was in 2016 and 2020. However, he saidhe anticipates results will be coming in from Pennsylvania earlier than they did in 2020, due to new election laws that allow votes to start being counted at 7 a.m. on Election Day.
“It's certainly not going to be like it was in 2020,” Fetterman said, declining to give a specific prediction of what day he thinks the results will be finalized. “It will not be the two or three or four days coming out of Philadelphia.”
As for how confident he is in Democrats' abilities to turn out voters in 2024 —even as Bash noted that registered Democrats have started to leave the state, while more registered Republicans have moved to the state— Fetterman pointed to the fact that Pennsylvania’s governor and two senators are all Democrats.
“The Democratic Party’s in really strong position here in Pennsylvania,” Fetterman said. “But when Trump is going to show up on the ballot, then that’s going to make it very competitive as well too.”
Bash also asked Fetterman, who was lieutenant governor of the state in 2020, if he had any concerns over Trump spreading claims of voter fraud in Pennsylvania like he did then, given the problems he caused by refusing to accept the election results in 2020. Fetterman laughed at the question: “It's the same shit that he played in 20 and it didn't go anywhere."
"I'm not worried about it. It's the same thing that he tried in 2020,”
Fetterman said. “We had an absolutely secure election. There was voter fraud in Pennsylvania and it was a handful of Republicans and they had their dead moms voting for Trump.”
Fetterman also noted that Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick still owes him a reward for identifying these instances of voter fraud. In 2020, Patrick offered up to a $1 million reward to people who reported voter fraud that led to a conviction.
He added, “There was no voter fraud. He tried. I would just tell him that desperation is the worst cologne and I expected he was going to do that. It's not going to be any more effective than it was in 2020.”
Bash also asked Fetterman about an ad from the Trump campaign attacking Harris for her support of transgender rights that says: “Kamala is for they/them. Trump is for you.”
But Fetterman reaffirmed his support for gay and transgender kids and said thathe did not think this was going to resonate with Pennsylvania voters.
“My version of being a man is like, ‘Hey I like ribeyes, I like Motorhead and I will never pick on trans kids and gay kids,’” Fetterman said.
He added, “It doesn't make you a man to pick on trans or gay kids, it just makes you an asshole."
https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/11/03/2024-elections-live-coverage-updates-analysis/fetterman-unpacks-pa-00186961