President Donald Trump openly encouraged Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania to switch parties and become a Republican, delivering one of his most direct overtures to the senator just weeks before midterm elections that could reshape control of Congress.
"I'd love to see him as a Republican," Trump told reporters at Joint Base Andrews on Saturday as he returned to Washington from a rally in Tennessee. "He does better as a Republican than he does as a Democrat." Trump called Fetterman "a great guy" with "great common sense."
The remarks carry real stakes. Republicans risk losing their Senate majority next month, and Democrats need to pick up four seats to retake the 100-seat chamber. With his everyman appeal, Fetterman was a Democratic star when first elected to the Senate in 2022 — but during his time in Washington, he has split with Democrats on issues ranging from immigration to Israel, fueling speculation about his political future.
Fetterman has repeatedly rejected the notion of becoming a Republican. In May, he wrote in The Washington Post that he would be a "terrible Republican who still votes overwhelmingly with Democrats." His office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Trump's latest remarks.
But his relationship with fellow Democrats has grown more tenuous. Last month, Fetterman recorded a video for the Republican midterm convention praising his fellow Pennsylvania senator, Republican Dave McCormick, while suggesting there were extremists in his own party. "I'm always going to stand with America," Fetterman said in the video. "I'm always going to reject the extremes and socialism and that anti-American way of life."
Trump suggested on Saturday that such flirtations with the GOP could make it extremely difficult for Fetterman to win the Democratic nomination for another term. The senator said in July he has no plans to leave the Democratic Party — but added he would reconsider if it became "the anti-Israel party."
Fetterman's breaks with his party have been substantive: he has diverged from Democrats on the Iran war, immigration enforcement, and Israel, while maintaining a voting record that still aligns with Democrats the large majority of the time. Whether Trump's public courtship moves the needle — or simply makes Fetterman's standing with Pennsylvania Democrats worse — is now the question hanging over one of the Senate's most watched seats.