Sen. Joe Manchin says he doesn't 'give a s—' about re-election
So, how much does Sen. Joe Manchin care about his re-election odds?
“I don’t give a s—, you understand? I just don’t give a s—,” the West Virginia Democrat told the Charleston Gazette-Mail. “Don’t care if I get re-elected, don’t care if I get defeated, how about that. If they think because I’m up for election, that I can be wrangled into voting for s–t that I don’t like and can’t explain, they’re all crazy.”
The senator gave this emphatic answer when he insisted that re-election had not played into his decision not to sign a tax reform letter sent last week to President Trump, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Finance Chairman Orrin Hatch.
Signed by a majority of Senate Democrats, the letter outlined major policies they supported, including not cutting programs like Medicaid and making sure the bill went through regular order.
After news of the letter broke, West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, a GOP candidate in the state’s Senate 2018 race, called last week for Manchin to step down from the Senate Democratic leadership team.
“As you know, West Virginia voted overwhelmingly for President Trump,” Morrisey wrote in a letter to Manchin. “Today, we proudly give the president his highest approval rating in the country. West Virginia could not be more different from Chuck Schumer’s New York. And many in West Virginia wonder how you can put West Virginia first when you are beholden to Chuck Schumer and his team.”
Manchin told the Gazette-Mail that he agreed with the letter, but he wanted to make more efforts to bring Republicans on board, hence his decision not to sign.Â
Manchin, who served as West Virginia’s governor from 2005 to 2010, has represented the state in the Senate since 2010. He won the special election for the seat left empty by the death of Sen. Robert Byrd. He then handily won re-election in 2012, with about 60% of the vote.
Still, the state has grown more conservative in recent years. It voted overwhelmingly in support of President Trump in the 2016 presidential election, with Trump winning nearly 68% of the vote. Last week, the state’s governor, Jim Justice, announced at a Trump rally that he was changing parties, from Democrat to Republican.
