Senator John Fetterman (D-Pa.) reignited intra-party tensions on Friday with a pointed social media rebuttal to Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), following her criticism that Democrats are not “fighting hard enough” to protect working-class Americans.
“This isn’t just about Republicans. We need a Democratic Party that fights harder for us, too,” Ocasio-Cortez declared Thursday during a rally in Las Vegas as part of her “Fighting Oligarchy” tour.
Fetterman wasn’t having it.
“Fight ‘harder’—a stunt that would have harmed millions and plunged us into chaos,” he posted on X, formerly Twitter, alongside a screenshot quoting the congresswoman’s remarks. “We kept our government open. Deal with it.”
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The public jab came after Ocasio-Cortez and several progressive House Democrats slammed Senate Democrats—Fetterman included—for supporting a procedural vote that allowed a six-month Republican-backed funding bill to move forward.
While most Senate Democrats later opposed the final bill, their support for cloture effectively cleared the way for its passage and helped avoid a partial government shutdown.
Ocasio-Cortez had previously urged her Senate colleagues to block the motion entirely. “It should be very clear to every Senate Democrat that any vote for Cloture will also be considered a vote for the bill,” she warned on X last week. “Defend Medicaid. Vote NO on Cloture. NO on bill.”
The funding bill passed anyway, igniting a wave of frustration among House progressives.
Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) called the Senate Democrats’ move “disgusting,” accusing them of surrendering their leverage. “Some in the party want to bring a knife to a gunfight,” she said during a town hall, urging a reckoning within the Democratic ranks.
Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-Md.) went even further, suggesting it might be time for new leadership in the Senate. “I think it may be time for the Senate Democrats to pick new leadership,” he said, referencing Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-N.Y.) decision to back the GOP motion. RELATED: Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer Faces Growing Calls To Resign Amid Party Infighting
For his part, Fetterman has consistently positioned himself as a Democrat willing to challenge the party’s progressive flank. In recent weeks, he’s called out what he dubbed “unhinged petulance” among some Democrats in response to former President Trump’s return to office, and has urged his party to “speak like normal people.”
Fetterman’s tweet comes as frustrations simmer on both sides of the Democratic divide—between pragmatists focused on governing and avoiding shutdowns, and progressives demanding bold stances even at political or procedural risk.
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