Joe Manchin isn’t into labels, apparently. No less than not political ones.
The West Virginia Senator went on a Fox Information media run Sunday, the place he refused to reply straight if he identifies as a member of the Democratic Celebration.
“I determine as an American,” Manchin mentioned when requested repeatedly by host Maria Bartiromo if he nonetheless thought-about himself a Democrat. “I’m an American by way of and thru.”
Manchin faces a particularly uphill battle in 2024 as a Democrat elected in a state that voted for Trump by 39 factors in 2020. He hasn’t but mentioned if he’ll run once more, however the incumbent does serve as one of many Democrats’ finest possibilities to maintain their slim Senate majority.
Though the staunch reasonable continued to attempt to discover a extra impartial path Sunday, he did publicly stand by his vote for the Inflation Discount Act. When requested if he regrets voting for the spending invoice, Manchin remained agency, calling it “probably the most transformative invoice that we’ve ever had” in his time as a Senator.
Manchin was first elected to the Senate in a 2010 particular election, succeeding long-running senator Robert Byrd after he died. West Virginia, a longtime Democratic state, has trended quickly to the proper over the previous couple of a long time.
Invoice Clinton received the state in each his presidential bids, carrying it by virtually 15 % in 1996—however that was the final time the state would vote for a Democrat for president.
West Virginia’s different senator, Republican Shelley Moore Capito, swept the state in 2020 with 70 % of the vote.
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