Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) on Tuesday afternoon dismissed the brouhaha over Vice President Kamala Harris’ interview on local West Virginia radio station WSAZ in which she touted President Joe Biden’s sweeping COVID-19 relief package without Manchin’s knowledge.
“There’s no apologies needed,” Manchin told reporters when asked if the White House had apologized, according to a press pool report. “I mean we’re all in this, we understand that.”
“It was a mistake. They made a mistake,” he added. “And we understand. We move on. You can’t dwell on those things.”
Later on Tuesday, the conservative Democrat, who is skittish over the notion of working without Republicans, announced that he would vote in favor of passing Biden’s $1.9 trillion package through budget reconciliation, giving Senate Democrats the pivotal vote to pass the legislation with their razor-thin Democratic majority without needing GOP votes.
“I will vote to move forward with the budget process because we must address the urgency of the COVID-19 crisis,” Manchin said in a statement.
On Monday, Manchin expressed frustration with Harris’ interview during an interview of his own on WSAZ, saying the White House had not informed him of the vice president’s appearance in advance and that her remarks had strayed from finding a “bipartisan pathway” to passing relief legislation for the pandemic.
“That’s not a way of working together, what was done,” he said.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said later on Monday that the Biden team was “in touch” with Manchin, whose vote is pivotal to getting the President’s proposal passed with the Senate’s razor-thin Democratic majority.
If the price of Manchin’s vote is letting him insist that “they made a mistake”, it is a price I’m sure the Biden Administration is happy to pay.
It is also evidence that the full-court press they lined up against him worked and he got rolled.
I think we all know who came out of all this looking like the winners.
Edit: Worth noting, as @cabchi points out below, that Manchin didn’t actually say he’d vote for the 1.9T proposal, or even something at a similar price. He’s just advancing the reconciliation process, which is important and significant, but means he might still want his pound of flesh.
I thought not!
Manchin is never going to be the vote that keeps Democrats from passing important legislation.
He’s not a big liberal, but he is a lifelong Democrat, and the most liberal kind WVA now produces.
Well, I’m glad to get that out of the way, whatever it was all about.
Now, let’s get this bill passed so we can get financial help and vaccines to the people who need them.
Funny how that works.