“How in hell can we stand back and watch as he seeks to marry the GOP in meanness and fealty to corporate power?”

He delayed the stimulus bill, demanding lower unemployment payments, and demanding they take out the minimum wage increase for his vote, necessary for passage.

Incredibly, he has promised to oppose Biden’s infrastructure bill if it has no GOP support depriving West Virginia of thousands of union jobs, jobs that will support union and nonunion families. Opposing the infrastructure plan would also deprive his state of critical WI-FI and broadband access as well as repairing aging roads and bridges and cleaning up the detritus of the fading coal industry.

Although he supports elements of HR 1 (the House of Representatives legislation necessary to re-establish and equalize democracy and access to voting, fundamental to the meaning of America), Manchin opposes passage of the bill in the Senate.  He says he wants to see it broken up and passed in pieces, destroying its power.

Married to corporate power as he is, he of course opposes the end of the filibuster, thus locking in top-down economic policy that punishes his poor state.

He is Senator Joe Manchin, Democrat of West Virginia.  Manchin inherited his Senate seat, his constituency, and the state Democratic Party from New Deal Senator Robert Byrd who spent his career in politics helping his state and its poorest people.  

Senator Byrd grew up a racist with membership in the Ku Klux Klan as a young man, but when he died, the NAACP said: 

“Senator Byrd reflects the transformative power of this nation…from being an active member of the KKK to being a stalwart supporter of the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, and many other pieces of seminal legislation that advanced the civil rights and liberties of our country.”

West Virginia is the third poorest state in America, barely ahead of Louisiana and Mississippi, part of the legacy of coal colonialism. Why would its Democratic Senator work so hard to deny poor people in his state the means to strengthen their families, raise their kids out of poverty, and stop good union infrastructure jobs? Manchin is one of only five Democratic Senators who isn’t a co-sponsor of the Pro Act, the legislation to allow workers to freely organize and bargain collectively to raise their standard of living with a strong union contract.

Certainly, West Virginia is Trump Country.  Since Byrd’s death and coal companies’ de-unionization of the industry the state has turned sharply rightward.

West Virginia Democrats have supported Manchin and sympathized with his need to stand close to the political center.  But how in hell can we stand back and watch as he seeks to marry the GOP in meanness and fealty to corporate power?

We know and accept that our Democratic Party is a very big tent.  But how can we accept being represented by a Democrat who won’t support raising wages for workers, strengthening working families, voting rights and economic and racial justice?  What does it mean for the leader of our state Democratic Party to not support fundamental values that define our party and our work?

Joe Manchin’s brand of neo-liberal corporatist politics is dangerous for America.  When Democrats join the GOP supporting corporations over the economic interests of working folks, rage ensues, and fascism rises.

It is now clear with so much public support and opportunity before us that Manchin would destroy any real effort to help the people of West Virginia up and out of poverty.  He would sacrifice us for his own wealth and cheap political career.

Joe Manchin isn’t up for re-election till 2024, but it is time now to turn up the heat on the Senator, highlight his assaults on his constituents, and begin to raise money to run a real Democrat against him.

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