Sen. John Fetterman on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., March 19, 2026. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
Sen. John Fetterman might claim to be a Democrat, but according to a New York Magazine report, bombshell leaked texts have exposed why he is increasingly President Donald Trump and MAGA's favorite: he basically sounds like a Republican already.
This week, New York Magazine published a new piece about Fetterman digging into the relationship with "little-known writer," David Safier, who has "encouraged and counseled" the senator in his staunch support for Israel, as the rest of the Democratic Party has moved to a notably more critical stance. Within the report, as highlighted by The Daily Beast on Friday, were a number of leaked text messages in which he sounds much more in line with typical conservative talking points, "mocking free healthcare, dismissing the Epstein files as a 'nothing burger' and calling Democrats hypocritical for their outrage at the killing of nurse Alex Pretti in Minneapolis."
The New York Magazine report noted that Fetterman's staff in Washington D.C., had grown "incredulous and exhausted" by the start of 2026, claiming that he "was acting like a Republican" in private. In January, for example, he sent a report to his staff which showed that the average annual cost of healthcare for Americans was around $4,000.
“How should it cost? Free?” he texted. “I don’t understand what affordability it is.”
When speaking about the fallout of the Epstein files, Fetterman said that there was nothing to them and that the worst of the revealed materials were about former President Bill Clinton. Experts had previously warned that the Trump administration would try to manipulate the release of the files so as to make Trump's enemies look worse than his allies and himself.
“Epstein was a nothing burger," Fetterman wrote to a staffer in January. "Worst pics I’ve seen were from Clinton lol.”
In the wake of Alex Pretti's death at the hands of immigration agents in Minneapolis earlier this year, Fetterman argued to a staffer that it was hypocritical for Democrats to make certain arguments in his defense.
“Kyle Rittenhouse brought a gun to a protest,” Fetterman wrote in the message. “He was roundly condemned for that. Why are now democrats defending the nurse it was legal to carry. Both legal weapons. Square that.”
As the Daily Beast noted, Pretti never fired the gun that he had, while Rittenhouse did, fatally injuring two men after traveling to the scene of a protest.
Fetterman's significant drift to the right since entering office has seen his popularity with Democrats drop to historically unprecedented levels. This has fueled some rumors that he might switch parties, with reports suggesting that some prominent Republicans are egging him on. Despite feeling abandoned by Democrats, Fetterman himself dismissed those rumors and said that he would make for a "s—— Republican."