Democrats have targeted fellow West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin in more than 700 Facebook and Instagram ads since November, according to a new report.
“Since the House sent President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better package up to the Senate in November, 15 Democrats have run more than 700 ads targeting their party bedfellow Manchin on the platforms, as the multi-trillion-dollar plan stalls in large part because of him,” Newsweek reported on Tuesday.
The full list of 15 Democrat lawmakers and candidates listed in the report who have run social media ads against Manchin over the past two months includes Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH), Lt. Gov. John Fetterman (D-PA), State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (D-PA), Adm. Michael Franken (D-IA), Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes (D-WI), Alex Lasry (D-WI), Lukas Kunce (D-MO), Jewel Kelly (D-MO), Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-TX), Muad Hrezi (D-CT), Bob Lorinser (D-MI), and Chris Couch (D-KY).
Manchin has been under attack for not joining his party on key initiatives, including a change to the Senate filibuster rule that requires a 60-vote supermajority for most legislation to pass in the chamber.
Democrats have pushed for a change to the filibuster in order to pass a new voting rights law that would federalize many state and local voting laws. Both Manchin and Arizona Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema have stated they will not support the measure.
Both senators have also opposed the party’s Build Back Better bill. Washington Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal blasted Manchin and Sinema in December in a scathing Op-Ed featured in The Washington Post.
“Nearly a year ago, President Biden laid out his Build Back Better agenda: a broad vision to meet the individual and collective challenges Americans face, necessarily ambitious to address crises both created and exposed by the pandemic,” Jayapal wrote.
“For most of 2021, Democrats worked to pass legislation that realizes that vision. The president negotiated with Congress, including Sens. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) directly. Sen. Manchin committed to the president — who relayed that commitment to House members — that he would support the legislative framework unveiled on Oct. 28,” she continued.
“But on Dec. 20, Sen. Manchin went back on his commitment to the president and seemingly killed the bill on national television. In a town where your word is everything, this was a stunning rebuke of his own party’s president,” Jayapal said.
The Daily Wire previously reported on Manchin’s opposition to changing the Senate’s filibuster rule:
Speaking to reporters outside the Congressional offices in the Capitol, Manchin was asked by Politico congressional reporter Burgess Everett whether he opposes changing Senate rules or invoking the “nuclear option” to remove the legislative filibuster.
“[I’ve] always been for rules [changes] being done the way we’ve always done them, two-thirds of members voting, and any way you can do a rules change to where everyone is involved, and basically that’s a rule that usually will stay, that’s what we should be pursuing. [We’re] still having ongoing conversations as far as voting because I think the bedrock of democracy is making sure that you’re able to cast a vote. If you’re legal, of age, and a United States citizen, you should be able to cast a vote, and it should be counted accurately. So we’re talking about those things there,” Manchin said.
Asked by another reporter to confirm that he was open to the idea of using the nuclear option to reform the filibuster in order to pass the Democrats’ voting rights legislation by simple majority, Manchin was noncommittal, and indicated that it would be difficult for him to get on board. “[Being] open to a rules change that would create a nuclear option, it’s very, very difficult. It’s a heavy lift,” Manchin said.