Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., unequivocally backing Israel even as its assault on Gaza wreaks carnage on the civilian population, has seen the departure of several top staffers from his office over the past several months. Now, a current staffer has gone on the record to criticize her boss over his hardline pro-Israel stance to Free Press senior editor Peter Savodnick, who reprinted some of her words in a profile of Fetterman.
“I don’t agree with him,” said Carrie Adams, Fetterman’s communications director, after Savodnick wrapped up his interview with the Pennsylvania senator. “I have a sense that his international views are a lot less nuanced than my generation, because when he was growing up, it was might makes right, and for my generation and younger who, of course, are the ones protesting this, they have a much more nuanced view of the region.”
When Hamas attacked southern Israel on October 7, Fetterman joined the rest of the Democratic Party in denouncing terrorism and backing Israel’s military retaliation, but angered many of his supporters by refusing to consider a more measured position while human rights watchdogs accused Israel of inflicting collective punishment on Gaza’s population or, at worst, committing genocide.
Fetterman opposes conditioning military aid to Israel, recognizing a Palestinian state and a ceasefire deal that does not satisfy the right-wing Israeli government. When asked about the now 40,000 dead Palestinians reported by the Gaza Health Ministry, Fetterman refused to fault Israel, instead putting the blame entirely on Hamas for starting the war. The Pennsylvania senator has also gleefully mocked pro-Palestine activists, drawing accusations of insensitivity and willful ignorance towards Palestinian suffering now and historically under Israeli occupation and blockade.
In the spring of 2024, several of his Senate staff resigned to work in relatively more pro-Palestine spaces, including the progressive Working Families Party and the office of Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson. Communications staffers Nick Gavio and Joe Calvello both complimented Fetterman at the time of their departure, but Savodnick noted that denigrating a former Capitol Hill boss is an extremely rare practice — Adams’ criticism of Fetterman was an exception that could indicate a much wider rift.
“This was the first time I’d ever encountered anyone—on Capitol Hill or anywhere else, on the record, off the record, on background, whatever—criticizing ‘the principal,'” he wrote.
Fetterman’s position on Israel has not only put him at odds with some of his own staffers and young progressives, who formed the core of pro-Palestine protests that swept college campuses this year, but also with more mainstream Democrats who are now publicly critical of Israel’s wartime conduct. The senator downplayed his decision to skip the Democratic National Convention in his Free Press interview, maintaining that it was a personal choice unrelated to his position on Israel and Palestine.
Even if Fetterman is skipping town, pro-Palestine protesters have chosen to show up in force, vowing to persist until the Democratic Party takes a stronger posture against Israel’s war in Gaza.