Sen. John Fetterman stood alone among Democrats this week when he voted against a war powers resolution aimed at limiting President Donald Trump's military actions against Iran, and the backlash from his own party in Pennsylvania arrived fast and loud.
The Senate passed the resolution 50, 48, with Fetterman casting the only Democratic "no" vote. Four Republicans, Sens. Susan Collins, Bill Cassidy, Lisa Murkowski, and Rand Paul, crossed party lines to support it, as Breitbart reported. The measure, Senate Joint Resolution 104, was introduced by Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia and sought to direct the removal of U.S. Armed Forces from hostilities with Iran.
Within hours, a growing roster of Pennsylvania Democrats, several of whom are openly eyeing Fetterman's seat in 2028, took to social media to torch the senator's stance on Iran, his Fox News appearances, and even his personal finances.
Fetterman appeared on Fox News the same day as the vote and delivered a remark that became the flashpoint. "If you have such contempt for Israel, I mean, you're also anti-American and you're anti-Western civilization," he said.
Former Congressman Conor Lamb, a Democrat from Allegheny County who has reportedly been traveling the state over the past year, fueling speculation about a 2028 Senate bid, responded on social media the following day. The Center Square reported his post in full:
"Israel's national security minister just said 'all of Lebanon needs to burn' so as a proud American veteran I say the pro-American point of view is to hold contempt for him and the government that gives him a ministry. Fetterman is a coward."
Rep. Chris Deluzio, who represents Pennsylvania's 17th District, posted his own broadside the same day:
"I'll tell you what's un-American: putting Israel or any foreign country ahead of America. We should be focused on Americans' prosperity at home, not carrying water for Netanyahu's genocidal and reckless wars."
When asked at the Pennsylvania Press Club earlier in the week whether he might challenge Fetterman for the Senate seat, Deluzio offered a non-denial that spoke volumes. "I'm running for re-election, which is this year, as folks know, every two years. 28's a long way away," he said. Then he added: "I've said pretty clearly, publicly, I get encouraged. I will look at it at the time when it comes. I don't know. I don't know what the senator's plans are in 2028 either."
That is not the language of a man who has ruled anything out.
Rep. Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania's 2nd District has been the most persistent critic. Boyle, who has been outspoken in opposing the Iran conflict, seized on a NOTUS report that Fetterman had violated the STOCK Act, a federal transparency and insider trading law. Fetterman's campaign attributed the violation to an administrative error.
Boyle's response on social media was blunt: "You mean the trust fund baby who cosplays working class? Knock me over with a feather."
That jab followed an earlier episode in which Boyle called Fetterman "Trump's favorite Democrat" and declared "He needs to go" after Fetterman voted to advance Markwayne Mullin's nomination to lead the Department of Homeland Security. It was far from the first time Fetterman has broken with his caucus on a high-profile vote.
In a March interview with ABC27, Boyle laid out the broader complaint. He conceded that Fetterman's overall voting record is "much more Democratic-aligned than a Republican," but said the senator's media habits told a different story:
"Almost every day, if not every day, our Democratic senator from this state goes on TV, most often on Fox News, never criticizes President Trump and is always criticizing Democrats. And I don't know why that is, number one, and number two, I really wish he would take an approach that is more constructive."
That complaint captures the real source of Democratic fury. It is not simply the votes, though those matter, but the spectacle of a Democratic senator who seems to relish publicly siding with the other team.
Rep. Summer Lee of Pennsylvania's 12th District weighed in Thursday afternoon with a five-word social media post that left little room for interpretation: "2028 can't come fast enough for PA."
As of that afternoon, the prediction market PredictionEdge listed Lee as having the third-best odds to win the 2028 Democratic Senate nomination in Pennsylvania, trailing only Boyle and Lamb. Lee's campaign did not respond to a request for comment from The Center Square. Neither did Fetterman's.
Former Congresswoman Susan Wild has also entered the conversation, stating that "nothing's off the table" regarding a potential Senate run, though she has not confirmed she would seek the seat.
An Axios report from October indicated that Lamb, Deluzio, and Boyle have all been considering a 2028 run. The jockeying is no longer quiet.
The political math explains the confidence of Fetterman's would-be challengers. A Quinnipiac University poll from mid-February found that only 22 percent of Pennsylvania Democrats approve of Fetterman's job performance. Sixty-two percent disapprove.
Among Republicans, the picture is inverted: 73 percent approve, and just 18 percent disapprove. Overall, 46 percent of Pennsylvanians approve and 40 percent disapprove, with 14 percent offering no opinion.
CNN analyst Harry Enten noted that Fetterman was at +68 with Pennsylvania Democrats in 2023. Recent polling shows a 108-point swing among his own party. That is a collapse in standing that few senators have experienced without a scandal involving a federal indictment.
Fetterman's trajectory since Trump's second term began has been consistent. He has broken with Democrats on judicial nominations, voted to confirm multiple Trump cabinet picks, supported the administration's immigration enforcement posture, and backed GOP plans to fund the government.
He has also been willing to challenge Democratic orthodoxy in public. Fetterman warned Jewish voters that they face a difficult future inside the Democratic Party, a statement that did not endear him to the progressive base.
The war powers resolution Fetterman opposed was no routine procedural matter. Just The News reported that this was the closest a war powers vote had come to passing the Senate in seven attempts since the conflict with Iran began. Fetterman had publicly signaled his position months earlier, declaring on February 28: "Committed Democrat here. I'm a hard no. My vote is Operation Epic Fury."
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer framed the vote in stark terms. "Today every senator, every single one, will pick a side," Schumer said before the vote, as the Associated Press reported, calling it a choice between the American people and the president's war.
Sen. Jim Risch, an Idaho Republican, warned that passing the resolution would undermine ongoing negotiations. "Voting on this, whether it passes or fails, sends a message to Iran. If this passes, the Iranians are going to simply stand up and walk away from negotiations," Risch said.
Critics of the resolution noted that it was a concurrent resolution and therefore did not require the president's signature, a detail that raised constitutional questions about its enforceability.
In 2022, Fetterman won every single county in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary for U.S. Senate. He went on to defeat Republican Mehmet Oz by roughly five points in the general election. He was, at that moment, the most popular Democrat in the Keystone State.
Three years later, nearly two-thirds of his own party's voters disapprove of his performance. His allies are Republicans. His enemies are the people who knocked on doors for him.
He has also publicly admitted that Democrats were wrong to push for ending the Senate filibuster, a concession that earned him no friends on the left and confirmed what many in his party already suspected: Fetterman is not coming back to the fold.
Whether that independence reflects genuine conviction or political miscalculation is the question that will define the 2028 Pennsylvania Senate primary. His potential challengers, Lamb, Deluzio, Boyle, Lee, Wild, are not waiting to find out. They are already positioning, already posting, already testing the water.
Fetterman's campaign has not responded to requests for comment. The silence is notable from a senator who is rarely quiet on Fox News.
When a politician earns 73 percent approval from the opposing party and 22 percent from his own, the question is no longer whether he's independent. It's whether he still has a home.
