Journalist Roundtable for Friday March 10, 2023

Airdate: March 10th, 2023

 

It’s Friday – the day The Spark host Journalist for a roundtable discussion of the week’s events and news. With us today are Jan Murphy and Charlie Thompson – both reporters for PennLive.

Among the topics discussed were Gov. Josh Shapiro’s $44 billion state budget proposal, the resignation of a state lawmaker accused of sexual harassment, and Pennsylvania Democratic U.S. Senator John Fetterman’s health.

Sen. Fetterman is being treated at Walter reed Army Medical Center for clinical depression but his health was an issue since he suffered a stroke last spring. The Washington County Republican Committee earlier this week asked Sen. Fetterman to prove he is “alive and well.”

Thompson’s take on it,”It (his health) has been since we learned in the days leading up to the primary last May that he had suffered a stroke. From that point on, I think a lot of people who were watching the races were wondering, is he is he going to continue his candidacy or is he going to step down? Because sooner or later there has to be a moment of reckoning when you have a health challenge like that. Right. I know that he was very eager to be a senator and he was very interested in trying to help build that Democratic majority in Washington. So obviously, as we learned, there was no way that he was going to give up that shot. And he took a few months off the campaign trail, came back during the summer. It was a different John Fetterman, though, because he has these ongoing auditory processing issues. And I think, by all accounts, what we’ve always heard is that they’ve always said there is no loss of cognitive function. Right. So you still get the same intellect and ability to to think and do and that sort of thing. But it’s just that that speech function and hearing others speech that that is affected and they’re working around that with tablets and that sort of thing. But so he’s taken on this job. But you know, what we’ve read in in the interim is that people have said that when you have a stroke like that, it was probably harmful to him to try to be a Senate candidate when he should have been focused on his recovery and that may have set him back and prolong the recovery. It may have even lowered the ceiling on how much of a recovery he can make. And all these things are things that will only reveal themselves over time. But, as far as this, this demand of proof that he is alive and well, I mean, it just that just seems like banging the drum for the base and I don’t think anybody seriously thinks that there’s some conspiracy involving Fetterman not being alive.”

Also this week, Democratic State Representative Mike Zabel of Delaware County announced his resignation after being accused by several women of sexual harassment. Murphy said she’s been told female legislators were warned about Rep. Zabel when they got to Harrisburg,”Don’t walk alone in Harrisburg at night and don’t be alone with Representative Zabel.

Earlier this week, Republican Rep. Abby Major of Armstrong County recounted an incident from last November when Zabel made her uncomfortable.

Murphy described what Major said,”Representative Major said she was at a bar in Harrisburg I think it was the Hilton actually. She was paying her bill and he came up to her and told her she looked great because she lost so much weight and he was rubbing her back. And she felt uncomfortable. And she caught the eye of someone, a male colleague that was there and made her way away from him (Zabel). Like he also had said to her, “let’s get out of here. Let’s go up to upstairs” or whatever. I loved her line at the news conference when she said I didn’t come to Harrisburg to find a boyfriend. I really feel like there’s women that are not going to put up with this stuff and that are, you know that are getting elected to the legislature that are saying, enough already, I’m here to work.”