Fetterman's Comments at Hearing Raise Eyebrows

Sen. John Fetterman raised eyebrows among conservatives after his choppy questioning and opening statement during Tuesday's Senate Banking Committee hearing on the Silicon Valley Bank collapse.

The Pennsylvania Democrat, who suffered a stroke during his 2022 campaign and underwent six weeks of inpatient treatment this year at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for depression, often appeared to struggle during the hearing, reports Fox News.

Among his comments, Fetterman said that some of the colleagues for witnesses in the hearing "went to go to Hawaiis (sic) after there was a crash of your bank" and that he "couldn’t believe it."

"So, I went up on the internet, and it’s like, it did happen. It did happen. It did happen," he said while holding up a printout of a New York Post headline that read "Ex-Silicon Valley Bank CEO Greg Becker Jets to Hawaii After Collapse."

"And it’s in Fortune, the second-biggest bank in U.S. history collapsed and chose to go to Hawaii on that," Fetterman added. "You know, I’ve never been to Hawaii and neither has my family. I guess I’ve never cranked, excuse me, crashed a bank."

He also asked witnesses if they think the federal government's bailouts of failed banks are a "running joke," which Becker told him that he does not "believe that's the case."

"Really? Because every bank you seemingly that crashed, it’s like, ‘We can bail him out. This one crashed, we’ll bail them out,’" Fetterman said. "So far, everything’s been true. So, doesn’t it feel that now if a bank really believed that they wouldn’t be bailed out, now after bailing them out, these couple of bailouts, they are going to?"

"Do you believe that that is not outrageous that, no matter how deplorable your performance is, you are made as whole and all by … taxpapers (sic)," Fetterman said. "So what do yous (sic) believe?"

He also asked what would have happened if there was a bailout, commenting, "Is it staggering? Is it a staggering … it’s a responsibility that the head of a bank could literally, could literally crash our economy…Isn’t it appropriate that this kind of control should be more stricter to prevent this kind of thing from going, or should we go on start bailing and sailing whoever bank regardless of how … their conduct is?"

He then attacked Republicans for the House debt ceiling bill, which calls for introducing work requirements for food stamps, and asked if the Silicon Valley Bank should also be subjected to a "working requirement" after its bailout.

"They seem more preoccupied when then SNAP requirements for works for hungry people but not about protecting the taxpapers (sic) that will bail no matter whatever does about a bank to crash it," he said.

After several Twitter users reacted to Fetterman's remarks, the senator's spokesperson, Joe Calvello, told Fox News Digital that "we have been clear for literally months and months that John continues to have auditory processing issues due to the effects of his stroke."

He added that if "sickos on the internet" want to keep making fun of Fetterman as he recovers from a health challenge, "that's between them and their consciences," Calvello said.

"It's a sad but true fact of life that some people seem to get their jollies attacking John for the auditory processing issues resulting from his stroke," he added. "They’re just shouting into the wind. Republicans already tried emptying the arsenal attacking John’s health, and Pennsylvanians had his back in a big way. As a senator, John is fighting for forgotten communities and all of the people of Pennsylvania, regardless of their social media habits."