Gisele Fetterman won't press charges against woman in verbal assault

The woman who berated Pennsylvania second lady Gisele Fetterman outside a Forest Hills grocery store will not be prosecuted at the request of the Fetterman family, which includes Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman.

The incident happened Sunday at the Aldi on Route 30. Fetterman said she was waiting in line when a woman recognized her and referred to her as “that (n-word) that (John) Fetterman married.”

“She said I don’t belong here,” said Fetterman, who was born in Brazil and came to the United States at the age of 7. She posted a video of the verbal assault to her Twitter account Sunday.

Pennsylvania State Police spokesman Ryan Tarkowski said in a statement Thursday that troopers investigated and presented their findings to the Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office. He said it was determined the woman’s actions rose to the level of “several violations.”

Warning: the video in this tweet contains explicit language

“However, the Fetterman family has expressed their desire to avoid prosecution, preferring the woman be given an opportunity to engage appropriate social services and other resources,” Tarkowski wrote.

He did not identify the woman in the video. He referred to her tirade as “racist and intolerable.”

Thank you all so much for your outreach & kindness this week. It’s our fervent hope that she is able to secure the necessary treatment and intervention needed in order to break this cycle. The optimal outcome to this scenario lays in a way forward and away from hate. pic.twitter.com/8bFmorxDoi

— Gisele Barreto Fetterman (@giselefetterman) October 15, 2020

Gisele Fetterman on Twitter thanked her followers for their kindness.

“It’s our fervent hope that she is able to secure the necessary treatment and intervention needed in order to break this cycle,” she said. “The optimal outcome to this scenario lays in a way forward and away from hate.”

Fetterman said the woman followed her to the parking lot and to her car, continuing to spew hatred all the while. She told the Tribune-Review she has endured plenty of insults hurled at her in the past but has never been attacked in person.

“If you look at the comments on any story that involves me, I pretty regularly get the ‘go back to your country,’ and calling me an illegal alien and all these very hurtful things,” she said. “I’ve gotten used to it over the years. But this was the first time to my face, and it was so aggressive and scary and a whole new experience I don’t want to have to get used to.”