Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) speaks out against a government shutdown.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00So, Senator, were you just in lunch, and can you tell us a little bit about how it went?
00:06In lunch?
00:07The Democratic lunch.
00:08I didn't go.
00:09Oh, okay.
00:10Well, what's your sense of the government, the impending government shutdown?
00:14Well, I've been very clear.
00:16If the House passes that CR and sends it over here, then, and there's parts of it that I don't agree with,
00:23but I vote for it because that's about shutting down the government.
00:29And I refuse to ever vote or withhold my vote that would turn into shutting the government down.
00:36For me, that turns into we would burn the village down in order to claim to save it.
00:43And that's chaos.
00:44And despite all of the chaos after, whether it's the Doge and some of the other tariffs,
00:50you know, if we shut the government down, then that's going to have a significant impact
00:55in the lives of millions and millions of Americans, undeniably.
00:59And if you are concerned that our economy is teetering into a recession,
01:04well, if the Democrats vote to shut it down, then now who's going to own that
01:11if the government shutdown, you know, spreads throughout the economy?
01:17Oh, she likes, you know, Wyoming trade.
01:21Okay, well, yeah, she'd bring me over here.
01:24And we want to keep talking to you, though.
01:25But at any rate, so yeah.
01:28Oh, yeah.
01:29Well, we want to keep talking to you, though.
01:31So you would vote whoever to shut down.
01:34I would not.
01:36I would not vote to shut the government down or withhold my vote.
01:40Yes.
01:41And I don't know what my colleagues are going to do,
01:43but I am describing that we can't shut the government down to claim to save it.
01:48That's untenable.
01:50And for me, that's one of our core responsibilities to keep our government working.
01:55Have you been speaking to your colleagues about this at all?
01:59Or have you heard from any of them about it?
02:02I really don't know, you know.
02:05What do you say to Democrats in your party who say that Democrats really need to take a stand,
02:10they need to do something, and that this is a—
02:13Well, you know, that stand that you take is going to shut the government down,
02:17claiming that we want to help and save the government.
02:20That's my point.
02:21I'm not going to burn the village down claiming to save the village.