Nov 10, 2023
Joe Manchin Reveals Suspicious Election BOMBSHELL
West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin makes unexpected announcement over his re-election and suspicious plans to travel the country posing questions on his Presidential election aspirations and where the Democrats will be left in the Senate. John Iadarola and Brett Erlich break it down on The Damage Report.
- 5 minutes
After months of deliberation and
long conversation with my family,
I believe in my heart of hearts that I
have accomplished what I set out to do for
West Virginia.
I have made one of the toughest
decisions of my life and
decided that I will not be running for
re-election to United States Senate.
[00:00:18]
>> Speaker 2: Okay,
that sounds maybe like good news.
Not necessarily for the Democratic
majority in the Senate since 2024 was
already going to be
an incredibly difficult cycle.
It almost certainly will
revert to the Republicans now.
But, look at least if
you're sick of Joe Manchin,
you don't have to deal with him anymore,
right?
[00:00:34]
Not so much.
He's not gonna be running for
re-election in the Senate, but
he's still hanging around and
he's got some plans, listen to this.
>> Speaker 1: What I will be doing
is traveling the country and
speaking out to see if
there is an interest in
creating a movement to mobilize
the middle and bring Americans together.
[00:00:52]
Every incentive in Washington is
designed to make our politics extreme.
The growing divide between Democrats and
Republicans is paralyzing Congress and
worsening our nation's problems.
The majority of Americans
are just plain worn out.
[00:01:08]
>> Speaker 2: He's accurate
in that last point.
I'm worn out.
I'm worn out by people like him doing
things like what he's talking about
doing there.
So he's gonna be wandering across the
country trying to see if he should run for
president.
He doesn't have, I guess, the guts to
just put it out there and say that.
[00:01:25]
Is he gonna be with no labels?
We don't know, but he's just wondering,
is there an interest?
What is the game that we're playing,
Brett?
Everybody who is going to know who and
what Joe Manchin is already knows.
We know how popular, unpopular he is.
[00:01:44]
He's not going to wander into
Nashville and suddenly the country is
calling out for him to save us from
Biden and from Trump, it's a myth.
Any third party candidate has a difficult
road because of the structure,
the nature of our elections.
[00:02:01]
At least a far left or
far right candidate in theory,
could have the effect of pushing one of
the two party candidates, even if they
themselves aren't able to make it on
the ballot and actually win this thing.
But these centrist candidates, to me,
make way less sense because at least
the far left and the far right candidate
[00:02:20]
might not have a major party candidate
that reflects their stances.
But Joe Manchin already
effectively has that.
His economic policies, I think,
are well represented by the candidates
that are already in there.
So anyway, look, it's not like this is the
first hint we've gotten that he could be
[00:02:35]
running for president, but it looks
like he's moved a big step towards it.
What do you think?
>> Speaker 3: I don't know.
When people don't seek re-election,
it's either cuz they have a better job
lined up that could be president, but
it could be some random energy sector
lobbyist scheme that he's got going on.
[00:02:52]
It's definitely not news because he's so
boring or
they can't win their re-election.
And I don't know what's
gonna happen with that.
I think he's just kind of been in
there for long enough and he's done,
Joe Manchin is important thing for
long enough.
[00:03:11]
But the one thing we
need to just point out,
in America when certain people say
moderate, they just mean moderate vibes.
They're just talking vibes.
They're just talking.
They wanna cater to that thing that a lot
of Americans have in their soul, which is,
[00:03:27]
why can't we all just kind of take
the temperature down and get, why is it so
polarized?
But what he doesn't understand is that
a lot of the policies that people want
are not gonna be favored
by a guy like Joe Manchin.
Most people want better
nationalized health care.
[00:03:43]
Joe Manchin is not for that.
A lot of people want cleaner air and
water.
Joe Manchin's not for that.
And the policies that
are moderate are not policies.
These guys who are just for
moderate vibes are gonna get for anybody.
>> Speaker 2: Yeah, 100%,
you could have a candidate who is like
[00:04:03]
a human version of Brett's
most Americans agree segment.
Forget about the Democrat and Republican,
we're just gonna find the things that
actually poll really well and
we're gonna push for those.
But that's the exact opposite
of what Joe Manchin is.
If you actually just listed the positions
he cares about and prioritizes,
[00:04:22]
they're not popular and they're already
well represented in government.
If there is a unity candidate,
he is on substance and popularity,
the exact opposite of what that would be.
He is effectively just a more corporate
version of the mainstream parties,
[00:04:41]
which are already predisposed
to do what the corporations and
what the richest individuals want.
So, again, it's why I don't know
if this is true for our audience.
Just when you hear centrist,
when you hear moderate, it is just so
utterly not meaningless necessarily.
[00:04:58]
It has been given a meaning that it
does not deserve by the media class
that largely agrees with the status quo.
So to put forward
a candidate like this and
say that it is anything
other than another tool for
the status quo to maintain itself
is just utterly ridiculous.
[00:05:14]
Polling wise he's not gonna have a chance.
Some of his votes that he has taken,
like helping to kill the child tax credit,
voting against codifying Roe v Wade,
voting against the voting rights bill,
he's just done a lot of
really reprehensible stuff.
[00:05:31]
None of it screams unity to me.
>> Speaker 3: I just like to say he's
facing Jim Justice, who is a guy who used
to be a Democrat and turned to becoming a
Republican when the realignment happened.
West Virginia is very interesting, and
he just hasn't done the realignment yet.
[00:05:48]
But this will solidify the final
realignment in American politics.
>> More than likely.
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The Damage Report: November 10, 2023
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