John Fetterman — the media-savvy political battering ram who serves as Pennsylvania’s lieutenant governor — introduced on Monday that he’s working in 2022 for the Senate seat vacated by retiring Republican incumbent Pat Toomey.
The 6’8” former mayor of Braddock, Pa., a struggling postindustrial city close to Pittsburgh, is positioning himself because the rarest of figures in twenty first American politics — a populist Democrat hoping to unite the occasion’s left wing with Rust Belt voters who backed former President Donald J. Trump.
The announcement video posted on his Twitter web page weaves collectively clips of appearances on liberal mainstays like “The Colbert Report” with photographs of a set-jawed Mr. Fetterman stomping by the gritty streets of small city Pennsylvania in work boots.
“These places across Pennsylvania feel left behind, they don’t feel part of the conversation,” Mr. Fetterman, 51, mentioned in his voice-over. “That’s why Donald Trump went to these small counties, and held these big rallies. We cannot afford to take any vote for granted.”
At the identical time, Mr. Fetterman isn’t shying away from his political positions — marijuana legalization, expanded LGBTQ rights, help for some components of the Green New Deal (sans the fracking ban) and a minimum-wage enhance — that place him comfortably within the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
Mr. Fetterman’s announcement was lengthy anticipated in a race that’s shaping as much as be probably the most aggressive in an particularly consequential midterm election. He has already raised about $1.4 million, and secured the help of a number of unions.
Other possible Democratic rivals embody two members of Congress, Rep. Conor Lamb and Rep. Brendan Boyle, together with State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta. Ex-Navy Secretary Kenneth Braithwaite and former federal prosecutor William McSwain are amongst potential entrants in what is predicted to be a crowded Republican area.
This isn’t the primary time Mr. Fetterman has sought Mr. Toomey’s seat. In 2014, he finished a distant third behind the veteran state official Katie McGinty, who was subsequently defeated by Mr. Toomey.
After working efficiently for the state’s number-two submit in 2018, Mr. Fetterman established himself as one in all Mr. Trump’s most persistent and colourful critics.
Case in level: In December, he demanded Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, a Republican, make good on his promise to pay $1 million for any circumstances of voter fraud found within the nation, after Pennsylvania officers introduced {that a} Trump supporter voted illegally.
Mr. Patrick has not paid up.
