https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WzR8I9XBro
The John Fetterman campaign is taking Katie McGinty to task over her comments at the first Democratic Senate debate this week at Carnegie Mellon University.
The candidates were asked if they had accepted the endorsements or money from the NRA, Pennsylvania’s LIFEPAC, or the oil and gas industry.
When McGinty said she hadn’t, Fetterman asked incredulously “Nothing from oil and gas, really?”
The campaign made a web video out of that moment featuring Jerry Reed’s “The Crude Oil Blues”. It goes on to state that McGinty received $198,600 in donations from the oil and gas industry during her 2014 campaign for Governor and her current Senate campaign.
The video ends with Fetterman’s answer to the same question.
“I’ve sought the endorsement of voters across Pennsylvania and I’ve sought the endorsement of the grassroots and I have not received money from any of those organizations,” he stated. “We’re strictly a grassroots-funded campaign and always will be.”
PoliticsPA reached out to the McGinty campaign, who sent the following response.
“Katie McGinty’s proven record on the environment earned the endorsement of the League of Conservation Voters, and is the strongest voice against Senator Pat Toomey’s failed energy and climate policies,” McGinty Communications Director Sabrina Singh stated. “It’s unfortunate that rather than uniting to defeat Toomey, some are instead peddling the misleading Republican talking points of groups trying to prop him up.”
The McGinty campaign also sought to counter Fetterman’s claims that he hasn’t taken money from those connected to the oil and gas industry. They point to a $3,200 contribution from lawyers at the firm Campell and Levine. That firm also represented the Koch Brothers in 2011. Additionally, two of Fetterman’s family members work for Kling Brothers Insurance. Fetterman has stated in the past that he lives off his family’s fortune in lieu of taking a salary as Mayor of Braddock. Therefore, they see his attacks as hypocritical.
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54 Responses
Senator there is one America Rising tracker that handles all 3 candidates. You’re so connected out west, you think you would know that?
Montco…as usual you don’t know what you’re talking about. Americas Rising has a tracker on Fetterman. The “attack” didn’t come from them. Are you trying to say that Fetterman is a pawn of the Koch brothers? Where did you get your weed this week? Better check it, it seems to be contaminated with something.
Montco PA Dem, the question wasn’t if it was from a PAC, and the McGinty campaign clearly understands that, because they tried to defend themselves, not by saying it was wrong, but by pointing to a few of Fetterman’s contributors from a law firm and an insurance company as if that has something to do with the gas industry.
That was a really strange and awkward defense the McGinty campaign made. I just can’t fathom how any right minded progressive could defend her on this.
Yes, by all means follow Hair’s link and read the article, it is VERY illuminating for several reasons:
— it completely clears McGinty on this issue. As the article states, she has received ZERO from any energy PAC in this Senate race.
— it identifies who is pushing this attack:”America Rising, an opposition-research group with strong Republican ties…”
— it reveals that Toomey’s haul thus far from oil & gas interests tops $300,000.
Toomey and his corrupt Republican backers know that McGinty is their biggest threat in November. That’s why they’re jumping into the Dem primary and trying to damage her campaign. They wouldn’t waste their resources on something like this unless they were scared witless to face her in November.
You don’t see the Repubs doing anything to oppose Sestak or Fetterman, do you? There’s a reason for that.