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Pennsylvania Democratic Senate hopeful John Fetterman thrice refused to provide additional medical records to prove his fitness to serve after a stroke, during an interview Wednesday.
Fetterman took part in a livestreamed Q&A with the editors of PennLive where he was again asked if he would release more information from his doctor before the Nov. 8 midterm elections, after being noncommittal in an interview with NBC News on Tuesday.
“I’d say if anything had changed, or whatever, I definitely would have updated that, except the progress I’ve made is obvious,” Fetterman replied.
On June 3, Fetterman released a letter from his cardiologist who had seen him the day before in the wake of his May 13 stroke, which was caused by heart disease.
“The prognosis I can give for John’s heart is this: if he takes his meds, eats healthily and moves, he will be fine,” Dr Ramesh Chandra wrote at the time. “If he does what I told him, and I believe he takes his recovery and his health very seriously right now, he should be able to campaign and serve in the US Senate without any problem.”
Pennsylvania Democratic Senate hopeful John Fetterman refused to provide additional medical records three times during an interview with the editors of PennLive.com on Wednesday
On June 3, Fetterman released a letter from his cardiologist who had seen him the day before in the wake of his May 13 stroke, which was caused by a heart condition.
So far, Fetterman has not issued a follow-up letter.
The lieutenant governor claimed, “it is clear,” that there has been improvement.
“I certainly couldn’t have sat in front of you in May or June or July,” Fetterman offered.
“I think the ultimate form of transparency is to be on a podium in front of thousands of people without using a teleprompter,” he continued, adding that most politicians use teleprompters “but nobody wonders if he or she she is able to do the job. ‘
While Fetterman had previously been reported to use closed captioning for interviews, NBC’s interview with the candidate on Tuesday drew a lot of attention as it showed viewers how the system worked.
The campaign said Wednesday that Fetterman’s campaign had raised more than $1 million in 24 hours in his fight against Trump-backed Republican TV personality, Dr. Mehmet Oz.
While Fetterman had previously been reported to use closed captioning for interviews, NBC’s interview with the candidate on Tuesday drew a lot of attention as it showed viewers how the system worked.
It sparked controversy, however, with the reporter, Dasha Burns of NBC News, suggesting that “it wasn’t clear he understood what I was saying” when she and Fetterman chatted before getting started.
Kara Swisher, who recently had Fetterman as a guest on her podcast, On With Kara Swisher, dismissed Burns’ claim, calling it “nonsense.”
“I’ve always been very honest in saying that I need captioning,” Fetterman told PennLive’s editors on Wednesday.
“In fact, I just had an in-depth conversation about M…NBC and I let them know that here’s the caption,” he continued, gliding slightly over the name of the media outlet.
However, clips of the interview did run on both MSNBC and NBC platforms.
“I’m subtitling with all of you now,” Fetterman said. “Because I know you speak and sometimes I will hear it, but if I’m asked a very specific kind of question, I need to know exactly what it is.”
The Democratic hopeful pointed out that “half of Americans also watch TV with subtitles.”
When pressed for additional documentation for the second time, Fetterman again pointed to the June doctor’s letter.
“If they think I’m not good enough, you know, they certainly wouldn’t have allowed me to continue,” he objected. “And if I didn’t believe I was healthy enough, I certainly wouldn’t . . . walk, you know, live without a net.”
Another editorial board member said she believed Fetterman was “reluctant” about disclosing his medical information — and asked if any other data might come out.
The candidate again claimed that he had already been approved by medical professionals.
“I believe that and that’s what they’ve already done,” the Pennsylvania Democrat said.