Manchin says there is 'no circumstance' where he would vote to get rid of or 'weaken' the filibuster

[brooklynite]

Source: Washington Post

Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin III said Wednesday that under no circumstances would he vote to eliminate or weaken the legislative filibuster in his most definitive statement yet on the topic, dealing a blow to Democrats’ hopes of pushing major aspects of President Biden’s agenda through Congress.

The West Virginia senator also suggested in an op-ed published in The Washington Post that he would be opposed to using the budget reconcilaton process, under which certain legislation requires only a majority vote, again to circumvent the filibuster, an avenue Senate Democrats have considered for passing Biden’s ambitious infrastructure package.

“There is no circumstance in which I will vote to eliminate or weaken the filibuster,” Manchin wrote. “The time has come to end these political games, and to usher a new era of bipartisanship where we find common ground on the major policy debates facing our nation.”

Even with all 50 Democrats in agreement, most legislation requires 60 votes to stop a filibuster. Democrats argue that while the filibuster used to be employed sparingly, it’s now used to stymie any issue where there is partisan disagreement.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/manchin-filibuster-biden/2021/04/07/03635ab2-97fd-11eb-b28d-bfa7bb5cb2a5_story.html

[Layzeebeaver]

1. What a jerk.

“The manchinian candidate”

He needs to be replaced.

[brooklynite]

2. Funny how the Republicans feel the same way...

[angrychair]

36. As of this statement

It is irrelevant. If he won't vote to remove or alter the filibuster there is nothing.

Not a single thing of consequence will pass the Senate for the next 4 years.

[Trueblue1968]

9. What a jerk. "The manchinian candidate" He needs to be replaced .....NOW !!!!!!!

WHAT YOU SAID BEAVER. You are 100000000000000000% right on

[GB_RN]

31. But With What?

From WV, your choice is 100% tRumper like Shelly More-Capito, or a DINO-RINO like Manchin. The 100% tRumper, I’d argue, is even worse. And no, I don’t like Manchin, I hate the guy.

[certainot]

18. shumer needs to tell him limbaugh is dead, the country is going 10+ points left, and the howlers

and screamers enabling/intimidating his global warming deniers are wormeaten

if he threatens to go GOP he needs to know without limbaugh the GGOP is fucked and in a long term minority

[madaboutharry]

3. I don't think is heart his in all that much with the Democratic Party.

He may be a Democrat, but a lot of what he does is to serve his own political needs rather than the needs of his constituents. I know politics is messy, but he lets Democrats down an awful lot.

[NewHendoLib]

4. there are no circumstances where I see him as anything but a DINO

[Layzeebeaver]

5. yes!

[Deuxcents]

7. Sure looks that way

[a kennedy]

6. Hey, are there any "friends" we could call on to change his mind??? 🤬

This Democrat needs some assurance to realize he needs to vote how WE WANT HIM TO VOTE. HE DOES NOT OWN THE SENATE......and someone needs to explain that to him.....JMHO

[Raven123]

8. If Manchin has a bipartisan alternative to anything that has been proposed, let's see it.

[muriel_volestrangler]

27. Yeah, it's now his duty to explain how he is persuading 10 Republican senators

to do their fucking duty and pass needed (and strongly supported, by voters) legislation on infrastructure, voting etc.

If he can't produce the results, he's full of shit.

[byronius]

10. What a fucking idiot.

Suicidal, genocidal, idiot.

Period.

[taxi]

11. When and if the vote would come up changes things

Can he be expected to commit political suicide for nothing.

[Marthe48]

12. Wish WV voters would vote to eliminate this jerk

His uncle went to jail. capito's father arch moore went to jail. How can WV citizens keep voting for families with so many skeletons?

[dalton99a]

13. POS is intoxicated with his veto power over Democrats.

Disgusting

[GB_RN]

32. Thing Is

And I’m not sure he realizes this, he’s actually have MORE power without the damned filibuster.

[kairos12]

14. If the Rethugs get Senate

they will dump the filibuster. Count on it.

[GB_RN]

33. This

[Jay25]

15. He knows damn well that republicans that are the ones playing political games.

He and Sinema are the republicans greatest assets against Democrats. I hope Democrats are searching for a way to pass a voting rights act without these two.

[regnaD kciN]

17. You can't pass anything with only 48 votes...

[Jay25]

35. I know, but if nothing is done and the republican' attacks on voting rights are allowed,

the Democratic Party has no future. Republican governors are suppressing votes throughout the country, all but guaranteeing they sweep every election (in their states) from now on, unless the courts rule against them.

Trump found loophole after loophole to do his evil as he pleased, hopefully Biden and Democrats can find a loophole to stop illegal voter suppression

[Miguelito Loveless]

16. At what point do people

here admit Manchin is a lost cause?

[The Mouth]

38. "Lost cause"?

he's as liberal as we are going to get out of that state. Period. That we even have a Democrat from there is a minor miracle.

[Miguelito Loveless]

40. As long as we kow-tow to his threats

he doesn't really do us much good. The man is willing to destroy Democracy in order to retain his "power".

[The Mouth]

41. So, you'd rather have a Republican?

and 51-49 R in the Senate? Because that is our *ONLY* option.
I'll take a couple of DINOs and at least the ability to get things out of committee.

It's like having the choice of a really crappy, smelly, foul, smoking beater car, or walking.

[Miguelito Loveless]

42. No, the option is

tell him we are going to put the voting bill to a vote. He will have to be the one to sink it and take all of the "glory" for sabotaging democracy in America.

I am sure he has been offered a lot of "incentives" (his wife got a federal appointment), and yet he continues to angle for more. At some point, the extortion must stop.

[The Mouth]

44. Anything we'd throw to W VA is

extremely small potatoes compared to the other issues at stake.

I'll be honest, I genuinely think that the guy identifies with his constituents and really mostly cares about what's good for them, not what will please the most strident voices in the deepest of blue states.

There are so many damned 'purists' who'd rather run a "real" Democrat (and lose) than deal with the reality that he represents one of the reddest areas in the country, and our 'majority is razor-thin; this election wasn't a mandate, it wasn't a carte blanche, it was a slim majority saying 'the other guy is a racist, incompetent dick, can you guys do better? you got 2 years'.

Politics is the art of the possible. People should damned well show Manchin some love and respect because he could switch to the GOP and probably win more easily and with a lot less stress and condemnation. The people pissed that he isn't liberal enough need to grow the fuck up and learn about how politics actually works. Sure, I'd love it if he and Krysten Sienma were solid, hardcore democratic socialists, but they aren't, and having 60 solid true-blue votes in the Senate is about as likely as you or me hitting the lottery.

[Miguelito Loveless]

45. Manchin is now showing

he is happy to prop up Trump's Big Lie, stating that January 6th was about loss of trust in the voting process.

"Our ultimate goal should be to restore bipartisan faith in our voting process by assuring all Americans that their votes will be counted, secured and protected."

The votes WERE counted, secured, and protected. The count was accurate. January 6th was about people not liking the count, and creating a lie to justify overturning the election results. Manchin now wishes to cater to those telling the Big Lie by cliaming that Republicans must be involved in vote reform, as they are jamming bills through legislatures stripping away voting rights.

Yes, we need him now to maintain our majority, but if he wants to stop voting reform, he should have to actually vote to do it, so the entire blame can be his.

[The Mouth]

47. The votes WERE counted, secured, and protected. The count was accurate.

Shhsh
they get violent when confronted with "facts"

[Bayard]

19. Shit for brains

Dems need to quit tip toeing around him, and just whack him. He's as power-mad as McConnell.

[PortTack]

20. Manchin thinks he has the final say..he may not!

Law professors: the filibuster is unconstitutional, and Kamala Harris can issue a ruling.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100215256096

I’ve seen more than one very confident interview by Schumer, Amy K and Al Franken that say some form of HR1/S1 will pass. Schumer repeatedly says nothing is off the table..maybe this is it.

We can’t allow manchin to be the final say..one man holding the entire country hostage..NO! Of course, that won’t stop him from voting no on these major packages

[autorank]

21. Biden taps Sen. Manchin's wife to co-chair Appalachian board March 11

So... we are to believe that the incredibly shrewd Biden White House offers a prime appointment to Manchin's wife in early March for nothing in return and three weeks later Manchin crushes the Biden agenda, even the Democratic Party, by supporting the filibuster. I don't think so. Biden gave the very lucrative appointment Manchin's his wife and, if he is needed, he can feign outrage at the evil Republic plot to steal votes, revise his position, and end up the big hero.

March 11, 2021

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden is nominating Gayle Manchin, the wife of West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, to be the co-chair of the Appalachian Regional Commission, an economic development partnership involving the federal government and 13 states.

https://heraldcourier.com/news/national/govt-and-politics/biden-taps-sen-manchins-wife-to-co-chair-appalachian-board/article_54be538e-070e-5ed0-aeb4-7f5d43f15c28.html|

[PortTack]

22. Exactly!

[angrychair]

37. Or...more likely...

His wife was given the position as a way to soften Manchin on his filibuster position and it had no effect because he is really doing all as an embedded spoiler in support of republicans in WV.

[autorank]

46. Possbly but...

... the Manchin's can do a lot more raking-it-in with the business interests that comprise the 13 states along the Trail. In my scenario, the Law of the Highest Bidder applies. But who knows.

[SunSeeker]

23. But he previously indicated he would agree to changing it to a traditional talking filibuster.

https://www.vox.com/2021/3/7/22318145/joe-manchin-filibuster-reform


Has he changed his mind?

Link to tweet

[TomDaisy]

26. he's behaving like someone who's having some sort of psychological issue

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

24. Senator, what is the very embodiment of a political game

if not the filibuster?

[soldierant]

25. Well, he's probably right -

if he doesn't do it - and SOON - soon enough to pass HR1 - he will never have another chance. We will never be in power in Congress again. For eternity, or till a bloody revolution, whichever comes first.

April 30th is the deadline for the Census Bureau to provides raw numbers to the states so they can start looking at how to redistrict. nd no, those numbers won't be perfect - they never are - and these will be farther from perfect from usual - but they will be what we get.

[Manifest Desmond]

28. Joe Manchin,

Give me Barney any day!

[dlk]

29. Perhaps Manchin would agree to a traditional talking version of the filibuster

Tradition is a value for many southerner and a return to the traditional version of the filibuster may be an option. However, I’m with Senator Warnock. Instead of the media focusing on Democrats about a Senate rule, why aren’t they focusing on Republicans, and asking if they support voting rights?

[Roisin Ni Fiachra]

30. I, for one, will welcome the Handmaid's Tale type authoritarian fascist

minority dictatorship that will be established the US due to the passage of HR 1 being obstructed by those who will obstruct its passage.

Heil Hawley!

[bluestarone]

34. Why do the QTHUGS LAUGH behind our back? (and right out in the open)

Only answer is JOE MANCHIN! to add here where are the West Virginia citizens on this? IF they support what Biden wants then it's time for THEM to put pressure on Manchin!

[Politicub]

39. I am burned out by Manchin. It frustrates me that one democrat

has so much power that he (or she) can shut down the works for progressive legislation.

And if it wasn’t Manchin, Sinema would be the sticking point.

There is so much that could be done that would lift so many people. The Voting Rights Act, the Equality Act, the infrastructure bill, and on and on seemed so possible.

[hadEnuf]

43. Is Manchin trying to restrain the Democratic party as much as he can before he decides to switch to

the GOP?

This clown is no Democrat.