The senator’s betrayal is devastating for the future of trust and cooperation within the Democratic party
On Sunday, Senator Joe Manchin finally said the word that many have expected from him for a long time: “no”. After a year of mammoth negotiations over the Biden administration’s social welfare and climate legislation, called Build Back Better, the senator from West Virginia told Fox News that it was time to stop trying and move on. At the same time, he released a statement blaming inflation, the national debt and Covid-19 – in other words, anything but himself – for the failure to reach a deal.
The White House was reported to be “blindsided” by the news. But progressives have long seen this moment coming. All year long progressives in Congress have been negotiating with moderates like Manchin over the Biden administration’s legislative priorities. They agreed to support an infrastructure bill which the moderates badly wanted (and which was, to be fair, a good piece of legislation) in exchange for assurances that Build Back Better would also pass Congress. They stuck by this deal through thick and thin, even when Manchin insisted on defanging many of its climate provisions. They didn’t even balk when asked to drop their demand that both pieces of legislation pass Congress at the same time, which would have prevented Manchin from shirking on the agreement later.