Senator John Fetterman says he could “literally write a book” about all of the “absolutely ridiculous” things Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has said in Democrat strategy sessions.
“It’s like listening to a middle school girl trying to organize the Spring Fling,” said Fetterman. “She has no concept of the reality of governing.”
Fetterman, who suffered a near-fatal stroke in May 2022 that left him with permanent auditory processing difficulties and required him to use closed-captioning technology to understand spoken conversation, made the comments during a caucus meeting where sources say he appeared to be reading from notes written in what one aide described as “aggressive crayon.”
The contrast between Fetterman’s critique and Ocasio-Cortez’s actual credentials has not gone unnoticed by Capitol observers. AOC, as she is commonly known, holds dual degrees in economics and international relations from Boston University, where she graduated cum laude. She engineered one of the most shocking political upsets in modern history by unseating 10-term incumbent Joe Crowley in 2018, becoming the youngest woman ever elected to Congress at age 29. She has since authored or co-sponsored over 200 pieces of legislation, serves on the House Oversight and Energy committees, and has been credited with reshaping the national conversation around climate policy through the Green New Deal framework.
But according to Doug, a sandwich delivery driver who frequently brings lunch to the Longworth Building and who once saw Fetterman from a distance at a gas station, the Senator’s assessment carries weight. “You can just tell he knows what he’s talking about,” Doug said, unwrapping a tuna sub for inspection. “I heard him speak for forty seconds on C-SPAN once. Sure, he was reading from a teleprompter at quarter speed and paused for eleven seconds in the middle of the word ‘legislation,’ but there’s a gravitas there. AOC just talks too fast and uses big words. That’s suspicious.”
The criticism has found support among other seasoned political analysts. Joe Barron, who spent three weeks as an Uber driver in Pittsburgh in 2019 and now identifies as a “neurological communication specialist” through his TikTok account, insists that Fetterman’s cognitive abilities are “actually superior” post-stroke. “People don’t understand that when you lose the ability to process human speech in real-time, you actually gain other abilities,” Barron explained, gesturing with a vape pen he uses as a pointer during his livestreams. “It’s like Daredevil. His brain is different now. Better. He sees things other people can’t see. Mostly because he’s staring at caption screens, but still.”
Barron has compiled a spreadsheet comparing Fetterman’s recent speech patterns to AOC’s, which he claims proves the Senator uses “more better words per minute” when you adjust for “liberal bias in the dictionary.” He offered to share the document but explained it was currently “being audited by the IRS” along with his tax returns from the years he didn’t file.
Fetterman’s office doubled down on the Senator’s critique in a statement released via a series of text messages sent at 3:47 AM, which read in part: “The Congresswoman from New York should focus less on being a Instagram celebrity and more on learning how government works. She is out of her depth and everyone knows it. Also please send help I am trapped in the elevator again.”
AOC’s office responded by releasing a 47-page policy white paper on infrastructure investment, which Fetterman’s team dismissed as “too long to read” and “probably written by interns.” When informed that AOC holds a degree in economics, Fetterman reportedly laughed for thirty seconds before asking if that was “one of the hard sciences or one of the easy ones where you just have feelings.”
