The reason for Joe Manchin’s treason against Joe Biden, the Democratic Party and the people of America is not politics. Manchin hasn’t almost single-handedly derailed Biden’s plan AND MANDATE so he can continue getting re-elected in a red state. Most of Biden’s biggest infrastructure plan, the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill is as popular in West Virginia as it is across the country.

Sen. Manchin has held up, debated, negotiated against, watered down, and tried to suffocate the $3.5 trillion plan for the sake of his benefactors–his coal interests: his symbiotic relationship with oil, natural gas and fracking, and to the broader corporate agenda.

That is why he is in the Senate. His only personal agenda is family wealth from corporations that treat West Virginia as a despised colony.

If Manchin were using a political lens to plot his position against Biden and the nation, he would pick through Biden’s reconciliation bill carefully, selecting elements most popular in West Virginia that could easily be defended on conservative country radio.

Then he could oppose what’s unpopular but still bring home the bacon like Sen. Byrd did for decades.

Those popular programs that could frame a Senate campaign are all improvements to Veteran’s Affairs especially hospitals in this state so proud of our vets, childcare for working families so both parents can work for poverty wages, home care for our disabled and elderly to keep us in our homes amongst our natural beauty, coal field reclamation, paid sick and family leave, extending child tax credit and expanding Medicare–all popular and desperately needed in a state of poverty wages.

FIGHTING FOR FEDERAL SPENDING TO HELP WEST VIRGINIA AND WORKING FAMILIES IS WHAT MADE SEN. BYRD UNBEATABLE.

Carving out popular programs and fighting hard for West Virginia needs is what Sen. Byrd would have done and what Sen. Manchin would do is he viewed the Biden plan through a political lens.

No.

Manchin is trying to blow up the Biden Presidency and deal the Democratic Party a vicious body blow on behalf of his corporate interests and income. According to Open Secrets, Manchin’s biggest contributors by industry are coal mining, other mining, for-profit education, natural gas pipelines, fossil fuels and electric utilities.

A murderer’s row of enemies of a healthy and clean climate.

Sen. Joe Manchin is not anybody the Democratic Party can afford to protect in the gentle folds of our big tent.

He has had a long symbiotic relationship with ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council formed by the Koch Brothers to force rightwing, plutocratic policy through state legislatures across America. In 1994 Manchin was the West Virginia state chairman of ALEC and a national director.

Manchin’s consistent, transparent effort to destroy Biden’s Presidency is a reaffirmation of his slavish devotion to the worst elements of corporate America, especially the dangerous fossil fuel industry responsible for activities and policies destroying Earth’s climate.

Sen. Joe Manchin is an enemy of the agenda that powered the Democratic Party to win the Presidency and both Houses of Congress, and we must fight him.

Democratic activists and organizers are mobilizing to pressure Manchin in these crucial legislative fights. 

We must fight him publicly to defend our policies and our vision, to begin to raise money nationally to oppose him now and in the next election, and to prepare and till the soil for a real Democratic leader to beat him in the 2024 primary.

West Virginians are mobilizing against Joe Manchin and for the Biden plan. Local folks have been and continue to march on and assemble for raucous rallies at his state offices in Charleston and Martinsburg.  Faith leaders are speaking out against Manchin’s intransigence. Democratic activists are calling his offices.  Op-eds written by Democrats against him appear in newspapers across the state.

There is a seething anger amongst Democratic activists as questions about moving Manchin take over every political discussion.

Bishop William Barber has helped elevate the anger against Manchin to a moral imperative with mobilizations in Charleston, the West Virginia capital and largest city.

Never before has Manchin so strained the impulses of the base: loyalty to a great Democratic President carrying out his mandate frustrated by our Democratic Senator.

What would it mean all over America for a kitchen table economics Democrat to beat Joe Manchin with a heavy economic agenda of lifting everyone’s life instead of the neo-liberal corporate policies of the past?

How could we ever fight for Joe Biden and defend Joe Manchin in 2024?

Why can’t we rural Democrats design an economic agenda that is based on the unique and un-unique needs of rural and country voters?

Why cede rural America to corporate colonialists?

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