Senator John Fetterman struggles through Senate Banking Committee questioning
Pennsylvania Democrat Senator John Fetterman appeared to struggle through his questioning during the Senate Banking Committee's hearing on the Silicon Valley Bank collapse.
A Washington Post reporter admitted Wednesday to passing along a misquote of Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., from the lawmaker's office that drastically cleaned up his actual remarks.
Economics reporter Jeff Stein took criticism for tweeting that Fetterman had asked Silicon Valley Bank ex-CEO Greg Becker, "Shouldn't you have a working requirement after we bail out your bank? Republicans seen to be more preoccupied with SNAP requirements for hungry people than protecting taxpayers that have to bail out these banks."
However, Fetterman, still suffering speaking and cognitive issues from a stroke he had a year ago, was much less clear in his comments Tuesday that actually left the witness speechless.
The senator said, "The Republicans want to give a work requirement for SNAP. You know, for a uh, uh, uh, a hungry family has to have these, this kind of penalties, or these some kinds of word – working uh, require – Shouldn’t you have a working requirement, after we sail your bank, billions of your bank? Because you seem we were preoccupied, uh when, then SNAP requirements for works, for hungry people, but not about protecting the tax, the tax papers, you know, that will bail them out of whatever does about a bank to crash it."
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., leaves an intelligence briefing on the unknown aerial objects the U.S. military shot down this weekend at the Capitol in Washington, Feb. 14, 2023. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
No one answered Fetterman, who was the last to speak at the hearing, after his comments.
Senate Banking Committee Chairman Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, then remarked, "Thank you, Senator Fetterman. I didn't see an eagerness on the panel to answer your questions." Becker was a witness at the hearing alongside former Signature Bank Chairman and co-founder Scott Shay and former Signature Bank President Eric Howell.
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Stein deleted his original tweet, admitting the quote had been provided to him by Fetterman's office and he hadn't checked it against the video. "That was my fault," he wrote. "Though it captured his meaning, I deleted the tweet once some of the words in the quote were inaccurate."
While it's routine for reporters to leave out filler words like "um" and "you know" when transcribing people's remarks in stories, the drastic changes to Fetterman's actual words in the quote Stein tweeted left onlookers flabbergasted.
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., was released from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on March 31, 2023, after being treated for depression. (Office of Fetterman)
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Stein was praised in some corners for admitting his mistake, while others castigated him for passing along a Democratic office's version of events without verification.
He was hardly alone. Fox News Digital found that other outlets like The New Republic, The Hill and Insider also provided a heavily edited version of Fetterman's remarks.
So did Democratic strategist Sawyer Hackett, who also put Fetterman's words in quotes but provided a video of his actual remarks.
Fetterman's health has been under a microscope due to the near-fatal stroke he suffered last year that left him with severe auditory processing issues. After he took office earlier this year, he was hospitalized and treated for depression.
Since returning to work, his speaking difficulties have been clear when he's had to make public remarks like at Tuesday's hearing.
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Fetterman squared off in only one debate with his Pennsylvania Senate opponent, Republican Mehmet Oz, in October and struggled to effectively communicate on multiple occasions, using closed captioning due to limited auditory processing capability. His victory was a crucial boon to Democrats holding control of the U.S. Senate, but the New York Times reported this year that he's had to "come to terms with the fact that he may have set himself back permanently by not taking the recommended amount of rest during the campaign."
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The mainstream media also came under fire during the Senate campaign for trying to whitewash his clear health problems, with some liberal figures angrily denouncing an NBC reporter who noted Fetterman had trouble understanding her during small talk before an interview.
The senator has also struggled to adjust to life in the Senate, given the challenges of recovering from his stroke and the need for technological tools to help him conduct conversations with staff and colleagues.
Fetterman has to carry around a closed captioning device that types out what is being said to him so that he can have conversations, since he cannot fully understand the spoken word on his own.
Fox News' Audrie Spady contributed to this report.
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