Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) is doing everything he can not to be labeled as a liberal in his upcoming re-election in 2018 and so Thursday he will introduce Trump’s Energy Secretary nominee Rick Perry at his confirmation hearing.
Manchin had been up for the job himself, but announced in December that he would stay in the Senate.
Manchin’s move gives a bit of insight into how he is gearing up for what is going to be one of the toughest re-election campaigns of the 2018 cycle. President-elect Trump won nearly 70 percent of the vote in West Virginia, a sign that it won’t be an easy race for Manchin.
This is just the latest example of Manchin trying to appear bipartisan. Manchin has been very public about his relationship with the incoming Trump administration and announced earlier this month that he had a conversation with Trump about health care and how to extend miner’s health care benefits once Trump is sworn in.
Manchin is one of the Democrats to watch who may be willing to work with Trump even on replacing Obamacare.
I understand the rationale that any Democrat is better than a Republican holding a seat . . . . but not by that much. Should we assume that Manchin will vote for Perry as Energy Secretary?
There’s no Democrat in congress that needs a primary opponent more than Manchin.
He is every bit the weasel that Lieberman was/is.
I hate Manchin. Hate him. He’s everything that undermines our ability to get anything done or even defend ourselves from the GOP/Teatrolls. Fuck him deep in his rectum and may it prolapse during the introduction speech.
Perry is dumb as a bag of hammers on most issues and corrupt as they come, but he does know how to do one thing really well, and that’s make a deal between people, real deals because he knows where the bodies are buried and also finds out what parties want. (Trump makes deals like a mobster, ones they can’t refuse, or ones that he can’t.) In some ways it’s better than having a True Believer like, say, Pence.
Manchin’s playing a dangerous game, but I don’t have a problem with conservative Democrats serving conservative districts if the alternative is a GOP bootlicker. Manchin though takes things way past that point, repeatedly.
At this point, Schumer needs to take him aside and ask “Is you is, or is you ain’t a Democrat”. And, depending on the answer, have a 3 foot piece of 2.5 inch radiator hose ready and waiting within arm’s reach.