Fifty bucks says he caucuses with the Republicans.
He is continuing to caucus with the Dems. The senate will remain 51 / 49 in favor of the Dems.
It’s the way he gets to be a one man Senate.
I guess he could threaten to caucus with the RNC if he wanted to throw a fit. But, it’s also 5 months until the election and the senate is basically only campaigning right now. They’re not dealing with much legislation. Their schedule for the remainder of the year is kind of comical.
If this was supposed to be some sort of power play, the time for that was several months or years ago, not on his way out the door.
He’s not running though? This is him changing his personal party choice for voting.
He’s not running as a Democrat. The deadline for filing as an independent in WV is August 1, and your application can be challenged if you changed parties in the last two months. So this move was purely to preserve his ability to step into the race for Governor or Senate at the last minute, if he thought he could win.
Or if they’ll pay him to split the D vote to ensure an R win.
Manchin isn’t running for his seat again because he is going to lose to the same kind of asshole he is, but with the magic ( R ) after his name.
Democrats hate him, because every Biden policy that was blocked for the first two years of his term was Manchin’s fault.
Manchin running as an independent isn’t gonna split the Dem vote. In fact, I’ll say the opposite: he’d split the GOP vote. Republicans who won’t vote for the convict, but also won’t hold their nose to vote for Biden, would probably find Manchin acceptable.
Democrats hate him, because every Biden policy that was blocked for the first two years of his term was Manchin’s fault.
Some Democrats hate him.
He’s not running, but his party will change in the senate, and he can elect to caucus with the GOP if he wanted. Which would put the Senate at 50 / 50.
Don’t let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya
Fuck that guy.
The real question then is whether the dems are willing to run someone solid and progressive against him, and whether that person would have a shot…
Democrats are not willing to run someone progressive for his or any other seat, regardless of that candidate’s chances of winning.
There are a handful of progressives in the Democratic party, against the party’s wishes.
And the party establishment can and has changed over time, the Democratic Party of 1890, or 1910, or 1930, or 1970, were massively different parties.
The party has generally trended more progressive over time on everything except economics, and that’s starting to change with the tepid integration of democratic socialists.
Well… bye
Hell hes been a monkeywrench in there for as long as i can remember. Let him screw the other guys for a while
Good riddance. Fucker.
RFK Jr isn’t working.
Bet he runs as the spoiler.
Another spoiler for Republicans, same as RFK. I can’t see any Dems voting for the guy who fucked Biden’s agenda so much over the last four years, but it’s totally believable that there would be Republicans who don’t want to vote for their convicted criminal nominee but also are too brainwashed to vote for Biden.
If Manchin runs as an independent, I predict he’d have the exact same result as RFK: more Republicans would vote for him than Democrats.
I can’t see any Dems voting for the guy who fucked Biden’s agenda
Really? Because all of the people I’ve ever seen defending him were Democrats claiming that he was the least awful senator West Virginia would ever vote for.
Hell, even Biden himself gave Manchin the pen used to sign what was left of one of the bills after he’d hollowed out the carcass!
It sounds like you’re deliberately ignoring that there’s a difference between actually liking him and being realistic that no other Dem is going to the Senate from a state where Donald wins by 39 points.
Yeah, because it’s all just a binary were people vote by party only!
West Virginia is an extremely poor state, has the worst health of any state, is generally pretty pro-union and loves a political dynasty.
Joe Manchin is the nephew of a prominent WV politician, in favor of the ACA and pretty good at pretending to care about miners. THAT’S why he kept winning in a supposedly deep red state.
If we find a good progressive candidate who ACTUALLY cares about poor people and labor rights, is in favor of Medicare for All, and has a relative who used to be State Treasurer or something, that candidate would be able to win in West Virginia WITHOUT being a corrupt conservative ass.
I don’t know much about West Virginia, except that most of the people running it still havedeep political ties to the Hatfields/McCoys feud. I handled litigated coal miner’s lung insurance cases for a while, and that came up again and again, to the point that that our local legal manager would monitor the family ties of local defense firms and judges.
I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s really what got manchin elected, but it’s also something that could work for lots of potential candidates
In 2012 Mittens won WV by 27 points. Tell us more about how these ultra progressive union lovers will quit voting for Bain Capital guys as soon as the perfect socialist candidate comes along.
He is the least awful Senator WV will vote for. I guarantee you the next guy who sits in that seat will be an utter, abject shithead with Confederate and/or Nazi flags on his walls and a bible dogeared to all the parts that hates gays and advocates death to non-believers, with the pages that say love thy neighbours untouched and unstained because the shithead never opened his bible up to those pages because those are all liberal crap.
Possible exception would be Ohio, but that state isn’t in play really, so it would change nothing.
I don’t know why he’s doing this. It changes nothing.
- he’s still caucusing with the Democrats for the useless remainder of this session
- he’s still likely leaving in 6 months
- if he were to change his mind and decide to run one last time, he’s still likely to lose to Republican Governor Jim Justice.
This is like trying to put salt and pepper on sandwich someone threw in the trash. It doesn’t matter. No one was going to eat that thing, and it’s going into the landfill tomorrow.
Presidential run in four years? Can claim to be the most centrist-y centrist that ever centrist-ed?
Had to check, he’s 76. Will be 80 by then. Please no.
Ah, yeah probably not then, didn’t realize he was that old, all that oil money keeps a guy young I guess.
Most important thing to note, he is still caucusing with the Democrats, and the Senate is not going 50 / 50. It will remain 51 / 49.
Won’t last.
About time.
Fantastic news for democrats. He was going to retire and the seat definitely would’ve gone to a republican. Now the status quo is maintained.
I wonder if the DNC offered him something to run again, but not as a democrat?
Centrists gonna pretend they don’t still love him.
Your point would be correct if you didn’t go around Lemmy labeling everyone as centrists.
Actual centrists love the guy.
Gatekeeping centrism. That’s a new one.
If you stopped using your own perspective to define and belittle others, they’d be more likely to consider your opinions. Just food for thought.
