Democratic Party

John Fetterman: 'I'm a Very Pro-Capitalist Democrat'

Sen. John Fetterman discusses the state of the Democratic Party, immigration, foreign policy, and the dangers of political extremism.

Nick Gillespie | 5.13.2026 11:00 AM

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John Fetterman: 'I'm a Very Pro-Capitalist Democrat'

Today's guest is Sen. John Fetterman (D–Pa.), who just a decade ago looked like the future of Bernie Sanders–style populism, a tattooed Colossus clad in downscale hoodies and gym shorts who championed higher minimum wages, pot legalization, criminal justice reform, and more spending on social welfare programs. After 13 years as mayor of Braddock, Pennsylvania, one of the poorest towns in the state during his tenure, and a term as lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania, he beat physician Mehmet Oz for an open Senate seat in 2022.

But since coming to Washington, Fetterman has blazed a path in the Senate as unique and oversized as his frame, routinely criticizing members of his own party for "catering to the fringe and agitated parts of our base" and accusing them of antisemitism and suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome. He tells Nick Gillespie that the avowedly socialist politics of progressive Democrats like Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner (an actual "communist," declares Fetterman), Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson, and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani are alienating men and moderates and spell long-term doom for his party and the country.

Fetterman denounces both former President Joe Biden's failure to control the Southern border and President Donald Trump's antipathy toward legal immigration, says that entitlement reform is overdue and the national debt "is a ticking time bomb," and praises capitalism as the one system that has consistently improved living standards. He defends expansive military action against Iran and in defense of Ukraine, praises Israel for being the one functioning democracy in the Middle East, and calls for legalizing marijuana and psychedelics.

0:00—Are Democrats catering to the fringe?

4:32—Why did Fetterman support Sanders in 2016?

7:53—Immigration policy

16:15—Would Fetterman support a path to citizenship?

17:22—Drug legalization

20:12—Where has Trump failed?

21:57—Israel and Iran

26:04—Does Fetterman trust the Trump administration on Iran?

30:10—Democratic support for Israel

32:19—The limits of military intervention

38:36—The national debt

41:20—Entitlement reform

43:25—Braddock, Pennsylvania

45:50—Fetterman is a proud capitalist

Producer: Paul Alexander

Audio Mixer: Ian Keyser

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript. Check all quotes against the audio for accuracy.

Nick Gillespie: All right. OK. This is The Reason Interview With Nick Gillespie. And my guest today is John Fetterman, the outspoken Democratic senator from Pennsylvania. 

Senator, good to talk with you.

John Fetterman: Yeah, well, thank you for the invitation to have a conversation. Yeah, absolutely. Oh, I love to have conversations with people all across the whole thing. And so, yes, it's a real pleasure.

OK. Well, we met 15 years ago on the set of Bill Maher's Real Time when you were merely the mayor of Braddock, Pennsylvania. Let me play a quick clip from that episode.

Bill Maher Clip [00:00:48 - 00:01:03]

Well, we continue to be style icons in our respective worlds. Beyond that, let's talk a little bit about what has changed in your politics. You recently wrote in The Washington Post that you're not going to be changing parties. People have said that, "Oh, you know, is he going to become a Republican or an independent?" But in the Washington Post piece, you did have critical words for your own party. You recently told Fox News, of all places, that the Democrats, "are an orgy of socialism." In your own piece, you wrote that, "the Democrats seem to be catering to the fringe and agitated parts of our base." What's going on with the Democratic Party that's upsetting you so much?

Well, let me just step back. I mean, I assume that you had the clip that, you know, all those years ago back on Real Time. Yeah. Yeah. I know that we had that, but I mean, is it fair to say that we reconnected online and then—like friends, and just, you know, it just moved on. So, I mean, most people weren't aware of that, the dust-up way back then. And ironically, just a couple of days ago, I was on the Real Time show. So a lot has changed since when you and I first encountered each other, and I was very eager, happy to have this conversation. So, you know, where we are right now, so if you could just, what's that question again? I really want to make sure.

You've told Fox News recently that the Democrats "are in an orgy of socialism." You wrote in The Washington Post that your party is "catering to its fringe and agitated parts of its base." What, you know, can you explain that a little bit more, and what do you think is driving that?

I mean, I think the extremism is driving it, without a doubt. I mean, look at the primaries all across in the Senate and in the House and look at the kinds of people that have already been elected. Like, for example, the mayor in Seattle, she's an absolute socialist, if not more. And now people, "Hey, I'm leaving," and she's like, "Bye." And just describe that kind of a thing. And then, of course, New York, that's its own situation too. And I thought DeSantis had a great line saying, you know, "Mamdani is my favorite real estate agent now." And it's driving people away. People can move and they can just vote, you know, with their feet. And that explains why Florida continues to flourish. But a lot of these states like New York and other blue states. We've read that $2 trillion have migrated out of these states too. So I don't think those are the kind of people that are the problem now. And if you make billionaires…you know, the Democratic Party is the problem, except they love the billionaires that fund those kinds of causes and those kind of organizations that are actually driving apart a lot of the protesting. And that's where that energy is as well. So look at some of the views now that people are espousing. So it's moving more and more in socialism and communism. I mean, in Maine, for example, Graham Platner, avowed communist. He described himself as a communist. Antifa, that's not a slur for me. That's not GOP kinds of hit. That's his own words, how he described that.

Can I ask you, what about your own personal evolution then? Because in 2016, you endorsed Bernie Sanders in the primaries for the Democratic Party. He's an avowed democratic socialist or a socialist at various points, he's called himself. You know, what is it that rubbed you the wrong way about socialists or communists?

Well, I mean, in 2016, it was much more about the minimum wage and some other very basic kinds of things. And now that's just turned into much more standing with Cuba, standing with Venezuela, standing with the Iranian regime, and turn that into much more— becoming more increasingly anti-American, for me. So my views really haven't changed that much. Things that I supported, I was very supportive about gay rights, you know, thing. Back in 2013, even before you and I, well, it would have been a couple years later. Yeah, you know, I was officializing a gay marriage when that was illegal. And I was happy to get arrested on that. So my views really haven't changed. What's really changed is the party. And in 2024, I was campaigning for Kamala Harris there as a Democrat, very clear we were going to lose and a lot of the excesses that we've had in 2020 came back to revisit, and that really, I think, cost us that election in 2024.

I'm sorry, Nick, let me say. The excess of the party back then summoned the second term of the Trump administration.

Yeah. You've said that the Democratic Party has become anti-man or anti-men. 

Yeah. 

What forms does that take? And again, I mean, you can say, "OK, well, extremists in the party are driving it," but what is the motivating factor? Like, you know, what is going on that people are lurching, Democrats are lurching very far to the left in terms of economic policy, but also identity politics?

Well, if you make someone feel uncomfortable or unwelcome, they will leave. And they've done that. Back in 2016, I've witnessed that. I lived directly across the street from a steel mill in the union hall. And I was doing an event for Secretary Clinton at that time. And I was asking the union president, "Well, where's your people on that?"  And he's like, "At least half, half if not more, are in Trump." And there was just coincidentally a guy in a big truck drove by and he honked, "Ha ha ha, go Trump, go Trump." And he had truck nuts on the trailer and had a Trump sticker. And I'm like, you know, clearly that's what's already well underway. And now I think we effectively can count that a lot of those traditional union members have already left the Democratic Party. And that's where we are. And it's been a serious realignment of parts of our base. And I think that's driving some of the more extreme things of our party now too.

On a rhetorical basis, you said that Trump is plain-spoken. And that's a charitable way of saying it. When he announced to run for president, he said, "I'm not politically correct." And then he launched into a diatribe against Mexicans being rapists and drug dealers and things like that. But is part of it that Trump doesn't? I mean, it's hard to say. I was going to say that he doesn't bullshit because half of the things he says are just completely made up, but that he is blunt and says what he means.

Yeah, well, uses and engage in things that I would never engage on that. Just a couple of hours before we are now have this conversation, he put an image of Democrats in sewage, you know, in the reflecting pool there, here in Washington, D.C. I don't do those kinds of things. I don't support those things. But I also think it's kind of ridiculous to heckle him over $13 million to rehab that. I mean, that's just kind of small ball, for me. But let's talk about immigration, you know, we absolutely, the Democratic Party became an open-border party. That used to be like a GOP slur. But then you realize those numbers. It really was. I mean, you had 300,000 people showing up at our border every month. That's the size of Pittsburgh, where I........

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