“Three months ago, my life could have ended, but I’m so grateful to be here tonight,” Fetterman said, thanking the crowd and his wife, Gisele, for their support.
“Giselle saved my life,” he added.
Fetterman, a press secretary said, had not prepared remarks before the rally. His return to the trail marks a significant step for the candidate, who has only headlined fundraisers and informal campaign gatherings as he recovers from the blow that came just days before the Democratic primary.
Fetterman, Pennsylvania’s lieutenant governor, didn’t spend much time outlining his vision for the state or his policy goals during the roughly 11-minute address, other than telling supporters they won’t have to guess where he stands on key issues such as raising the federal minimum wage, protecting access to reproductive care, supporting unions, and ending filibustering. But he took several jabs at Republican Senate candidate Mehmet Oz, saying, “There are many differences between me and Dr. Oz. Who would have thought I’d be the normal one?’
“He doesn’t live here. He’s not for us. He doesn’t care about us,” he said later.
At times, Fetterman’s voice sounded like he was at the end of a thought. In an interview with CNN affiliate KDKA Thursday night, he acknowledged that he has had some lingering issues since the stroke, including problems with auditory processing. “Sometimes I’ll miss a word or I might put two words together sometimes in a conversation, but that’s really the only problem and it’s getting better and better every day,” he said.
Fetterman easily won the primary and spent the next months recovering as he eyed the general election against Oz. The Pennsylvania Senate race to succeed retiring GOP Sen. Pat Toomey represents Democrats’ best chance to pick up a seat in the evenly divided Senate in what is expected to be a testy midterm election for President Joe Biden’s party.
Erie is a strategic seat for the Democratic candidate – Erie County voted for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012, then switched to Donald Trump in 2016 before switching back to the Democrats in 2020, supporting with a small part of Biden. Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, with Fetterman as his running mate, carried the district by more than 20 points in 2018.
“If you can’t win Erie County, you can’t win Pennsylvania,” Fetterman said Friday to thunderous applause.
A long line of voters had gathered outside the Bayfront Convention Center with a look of excitement before the candidate took the stage, eager to hear the Democrat speak.
Bonnie Kazane, an Erie resident who describes herself as a “staunch Fetterman supporter,” told CNN that she was previously an independent but re-registered as a Democrat to vote for Fetterman in the May primary: “Fetterman was the party to switch to, so I switched to the Democratic Party.”
“He’s for Pennsylvania, he’s not a politician. He doesn’t have an agenda, and I think his agenda is to make Pennsylvania better,” Cassane said, adding that legalizing marijuana, part of Fetterman’s platform, is one of her top priorities.
Mike Dropcho, a retired X-ray technician and former union member, told CNN he liked that Fetterman was “down to earth.”
“He’s not some celebrity who’s just in it for who knows what,” Dropcio said. “Seems to me like a person who is for the people. He is one of us.”
Asked about Fetterman’s health and his return to the campaign trail Friday, Dropcio said he was confident Fetterman would be back.
“After working in the medical field for so long and seeing the reports, I knew he would retire well,” he said.
Despite being off the campaign trail for most of the summer, Fetterman outperformed Oz in the second quarter — bringing in nearly $11 million in the three months ended June 30, compared with about $5.5 million, including a $3.2 million dollar personal loans, for his opponent. Fetterman also used a series of TV ads and digital strategies to try to frame the famous doctor as an out-of-state figure who moved to Pennsylvania from New Jersey to run for Senate. Most recently, the campaign paid for a billboard on the New Jersey side of the Betsy Ross Bridge outside of Philadelphia. “Now leaving New Jersey for Pennsylvania…just like Dr. Oz,” the billboard read.
Oz’s response — or lack thereof — has alarmed the Republican Party.
A Fox poll released in late July found Fetterman leading Oz by 11 points, 47% to 36%. The poll also found that Oz supporters were far less enthusiastic than Fetterman supporters, with 68 percent of Democratic supporters saying they did so enthusiastically, compared to 35 percent for Oz supporters.
The Oz campaign focuses on Fetterman’s final time away from public campaigning.
In a video posted in July, Oz notes that “Fetterman is back on the campaign trail” as he laces up his running shoes.
“I prayed for him. I’m glad he’s okay…Now that he’s back, John Fetterman can’t hide from the voters forever,” Oz says as he runs off. “I’m glad Fetterman is healthy so we can worry less about his heart and hood and more about the crazy leftist ideas in his head.”
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