- President Donald Trump openly encouraged Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania to switch parties and become a Republican just weeks before the midterm elections could reshape control of Congress.

"I'd love to see him as a Republican," Trump told reporters at Joint Base Andrews on Saturday as he returned to Washington from a rally in Tennessee.

"He does better as a Republican than he does as a Democrat." The comments were among the most direct overtures by Trump to woo Fetterman into the GOP, a matter of growing importance as the party could lose its Senate majority in next month's elections.