Why John Fetterman's Twitter trolling of Dr. Oz works so well [View all]

Months ago, Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman was forced off the campaign trail in his race for the U.S. Senate after he had a stroke and underwent surgery to install a pacemaker. In place of the in-person politicking that he relied on to win his primary race, his team has been forced to get creative in the contest against the GOP candidate, celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz.

There’s a lot of trolling in politics these days, and it often includes inflammatory statements focused on race or immigration status. In a marvelous subversion of those smear tactics, Fetterman’s team argues that Oz is an immigrant who doesn’t connect with the history and culture of Pennsylvanians and doesn’t understand the values of the people he seeks to represent. Not because Oz’s parents were born in Turkey. That’s not a problem. The problem is Oz is from New Jersey.

Oz as a New Jerseyan is a theme the Fetterman campaign and its supporters have hammered hard on the past few weeks. There was the video from “Jersey Shore” star Nicole “Snooki” Polizzi wishing Oz luck on his move to Pennsylvania to “look for a new job.” There was the compilation of Oz’s mansions, not one of which is in Pennsylvania. And most recently, there was a video of Fetterman launching a petition to get Oz inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame.

“Where are you from?” can be a loaded question, but you’d think that by time candidates decide to begin begging a community for its support, they would be able to provide an answer. It’s almost always a mess when they aren’t, as we saw in New York when skepticism over mayoral candidate Eric Adams’ home address ran high. But Oz’s inability to provide a satisfying answer has left him vulnerable to the constant and cheerful hits Fetterman’s camp doles out.

In general, being a newcomer to a state may matter even less today than it did when Hillary Clinton won a New York Senate seat in 2000; still, Fetterman’s campaign accusing Oz of being an outsider has been deployed with tremendous skill against the Republican who was living in New Jersey as recently as 2020.

https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/why-john-fetterman-s-twitter-trolling-dr-oz-works-so-n1297452

It wasn't "months" ago like they make it sound. By my count it was 7 or 8 weeks.