WATCH: Outgoing Sen. Joe Manchin Says Democratic Party is ‘So Toxic’ — ‘This Country is Not Going Left’
Outgoing West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin told CNN that the Democrat Party is “so toxic” and that the country is “not going left.”
Manchin said that “Washington Democrats have tried to mainstream the extreme.”
West Virginia Governor Jim Justice won the senate race for Manchin’s empty seat in November, flipping it red.
Manchin left the Democrat Party earlier in the year and is now registered as an independent.
Speaking to CNN’s Manu Raju in an interview that aired on Sunday, Manchin said, “I am not a Democrat. In the form of what the Democratic Party has turned itself into, the national brand? Absolutely not. And they know that.”
“Here’s what I told them,” Manchin continued. “I said, you ought to figure out how you lost somebody like me. I was born as a Democrat because of my grandfather’s love of FDR. I was a very strong Democrat because of my family’s love of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. I came through the whole iteration, and then I was a Democrat in West Virginia, and it has always been a 75 to 80% plurality of Democrats, registered Democrats. But there was a split. I was never in the liberal side of it. I was never in the establishment side. So I always had to fight my way through.”
Outgoing Senator Joe Manchin, now an Independent, spoke with CNN today about some challenges for the Democrat Party he left behind.
“The (Democrat) brand got so bad…it’s toxic…
“Washington Democrats have tried to mainstream the extreme.”
. pic.twitter.com/bIFAM4Q4GD— Paul Villarreal (AKA Vince Manfeld) (@AureliusStoic1) December 22, 2024
Raju asked, “Is it a shift on social issues?”
“Yeah. The brand got so bad, the ‘D-brand’ has been so maligned from the standpoint of, it’s just it’s toxic. And the D-brand is basically this. You know, I’ve told them. I said, first of all, as an American, and as a as someone in the Senate, and I’m going to take the constitutional oath, the Constitution that I take very, very, very, very seriously, I’m going to help every human being pursue…happiness in their life, pursuit of happiness.”
“They have basically expanded upon thinking, ‘Well, we want to protect you there, but we’re going to tell you how you should live your life from that far on,’” Manchin continued.
Though West Virginia is a deep red state, Manchin held on to his office since 2010.
Manchin said the progressive far-left members of his party are out of touch with average Americans.
“This country is not going left,” he asserted.
Before leaving office and his party, the senator had long been the target of Democrats’ ire over his refusal to cave to their every whim.
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