Oprah Winfrey has unveiled a November surprise: She has endorsed Pennsylvania Democratic senate candidate John Fetterman, rejecting his opponent, Republican Mehmet Oz — the man she helped transform into a national celebrity.
Well, it took her long enough.
With the race in a dead heat, her status as an ultra-celebrity could help nudge things in Fetterman’s favor.
Speaking at a virtual get-out-the-vote event on Thursday evening, Winfrey said, “I will tell you all this, if I lived in Pennsylvania, I would have already cast my vote for John Fetterman for many reasons.”
The statement turned heads because Winfrey’s relationship with Oz goes back years. Oz is a former heart surgeon, and he developed a national profile as a celebrity doctor through scores of appearances on “The Oprah Winfrey Show.” That led to his own spin-off show in 2009, co-produced by Winfrey’s production company, which ran until this past January.
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By supporting Fetterman, Winfrey goes some way toward repairing the damage done by that earlier backing of Oz. After all, she didn’t just play a fundamental role in his rise into a national celebrity. Through her production company, she also bears some responsibility for his shameless practice of peddling of dangerous pseudoscience and promising fake miracle cures to millions of Americans. Oz’s skill as a snake oil salesman is part of why he commands big audiences (and it also partially explains the audacity it took to move to Pennsylvania in 2020 just to bid for one of the state’s Senate seats).
But given Winfrey’s pivotal role in the rise of Oz — who is backed by former president Donald Trump and converted overnight from supporting abortion rights to opposing them — her endorsement is strikingly late. Over a million mail-in and early in-person votes have already been cast, and Election Day is less than a week away.
Still with the race in a dead heat, her status as an ultra-celebrity could help nudge things in Fetterman’s favor. Oprah is a first-name-only celebrity who can make news with a snap of her fingers and can help highlight political races to big audiences who may be less interested politics and current events.
Scholars at Northwestern University and the University of Maryland found that Winfrey’s intervention in the 2008 presidential primaries resulted in an additional 1 million votes for then-Sen. Barack Obama. Winfrey might not be able to change minds in this race, but her endorsement could help fire up the base, particularly after Fetterman took a blow in media coverage after struggling to communicate clearly in his debate with Oz in October. And of course the soapy drama of her breaking with Oz in such a consequential way has the capacity to make the news travel further. Fetterman knows all this, which is why he’s reportedly been courting her endorsement for months. Immediately after her statement of support, Fetterman capitalized on it with a mock “Oprah’s Book Club” seal of approval on his Twitter profile. #NewProfilePic pic.twitter.com/mla50A5HWa Why Winfrey took so long to intervene is unclear. Had she pushed aggressively for Fetterman earlier, it’s possible she could’ve made more of a splash. Winfrey, always a careful operator, could’ve been hesitant to enter the fray when Fetterman was favored to win — but was moved to do so after his lead in the polls evaporated in recent weeks. This way, if Fetterman loses — in a race that could tip the Senate in favor of Republican control — Winfrey can at least try to claim that her hands are clean. But an earlier endorsement could’ve done more to keep the man she made a T.V. king from also becoming a senator.
Zeeshan Aleem is a writer for MS NOW. Sign up for his newsletter. 
