 What's that? Joe Manchin is doing something that's detrimental to American democracy. I'm so surprised I never would have expected someone like Joe Manchin to do something bad I feel like he takes all of the news all of the negative headlines about him as a sort of challenge and Because maybe he's like a contrarian to the core. He sees that when people realize he's bad He's like actually I'm worse than that Your expectations all the bad things that you thought about me. I'm actually worse I mean, I don't know how else to explain it. So his latest shenanigans revolves around the Supreme Court Drama that could possibly unfold in the event another Supreme Court vacancy opens up before the midterm elections this year because he would reportedly not be on board with that maybe kind of if The Democratic Party had a chance to take back the Supreme Court So as Alexander Bolton of the Hill writes Joe Manchin tells a Manu Raju of CNN and other reporters that if there's another Skotis vacancy right before the midterm election the Senate shouldn't vote on Biden's nominee before the 2023 majority is known I'm not going to be hypocritical on that. He says so let me just put that into perspective for you If it is the case that his party supposedly has an opportunity To balance the Supreme Court and take it from a far right a Supermajority to just a regular far-right majority. He's like no, we're not gonna do that not before this election No way. I'm very principled. Yes, we all know Joe Manchin is being a perfectly consistent principled politician I mean if we're talking about his self-serving politics and corruption then sure there's consistency there but when it comes to policy or Priorities in Congress. He's not consistent at all not even close back in January of 2021 after Joe Biden was sworn in it was him that called for four trillion in infrastructure spending and then When Democrats proposed an infrastructure bill he cuts it in half and then a fourth and then just kills Build back better which was part of their human infrastructure effort. So where is this posturing even coming from? But apparently he wanted to clarify his statements So he didn't seem too unreasonable because I mean Joe Manchin is definitely reasonable So Manu Raju tweets Manchin later says he quote misspoke and was referring to a confirmation vote right before a week or two A presidential election. Okay, not midterm election initial question was about midterm election Mm-hmm. Sure totally believable now the reason why he likely Had to make this Clarification or state that he misspoke is because he wants to at least uphold this facade a little bit that he is a Democrat it really gives him a lot of power just proportional sway over everything in the Senate He's really the dealmaker currently, right him and Kirsten Sinema But you know if he were to be a Republican then all of his power kind of just diminishes to an extent Perhaps he can pretend to be at least a Mercoschia Susan Collins Where he agonizes over a certain policy and then ultimately votes with Republicans That's usually what it does anyways, but he likes being in this position So he wanted to make it seem as if oh no, I'm talking about a presidential election And when you said midterms I heard presidential election because if he actually Abides by this logic if he really went with what he said earlier He's quite literally just doing the bidding of the Republican Party because let me remind you what happened on October 6 2018 a midterm election year. He voted for the Republican Party's Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh the New York Times reports judge Brett M. Kavanaugh was confirmed to the Supreme Court on Saturday By one of the slimmest Marges in American history locking in a solid conservative majority on the court and capping a Rancorous battle that began as a debate over judicial ideology and concluded with the national reckoning over sexual misconduct as A course of women in the Senate's public galleries repeatedly interrupted the proceedings with cries of shame Sombra looking senators voted 50 to 48 almost entirely along party lines to elevate judge Kavanaugh The final result was expected all senators had announced their intentions by Friday Senator Joe Manchin the third of West Virginia was the lone Democrat to support judge Kavanaugh So yeah, Joe Manchin voted to confirm a far-right Supreme Court justice One month before the 2018 election and this wasn't just any far-right Supreme Court justice This was somebody who was very credibly accused of rape So, I mean, I don't I don't even know why he said what he said He clearly walked it back because he's anticipating more backlash even though I feel like he likes the backlash I think he just wants to give himself some plausible deniability right, maybe he wants to see Or seem as if he's perfectly equal, you know right in the middle of Democrats and Republicans, okay I confirmed the Republicans You know scotis nominee during an election year and now I am confirming a Democratic Party's nominee during an election year But no more than one just just One only if it's two then no, I'm pulling the brakes right there I I just I don't understand what the point of all of this is then and you really Wouldn't help as a Democrat. You wouldn't help your own party Get a little bit more sway over The Supreme Court. It's six three right now So you wouldn't try to at least give them five four and keep in mind that whenever he talks about bipartisanship This is really asymmetric bipartisanship what he means in actuality is bipartisanship so long as it benefits the Republican Party Because when he talks about bipartisanship usually it's within the context of I'm going to obstruct the Democratic Party's Agenda because back in 2018 going back to Brett Kavanaugh It was a great example of him kind of proving that he's a fraud because what was he saying? What was one of the excuses that he used to kill the bill back better aside from you know budgetary issues and fiscal You know austerity bullshit. He was saying well look I can't support something that is just too partisan He said this about voting rights. I believe he said, you know, there's no Republicans on board So I want to construct a legislation that will at least get some Republicans. Well, wait a second You voted to confirm Brett Kavanaugh a very partisan judge To the Supreme Court back in 2018. Why didn't you block Republicans back then? Why didn't you say you know what I support Kavanaugh personally? But I think that the Republican Party needs to nominate someone a little bit more moderate to kind of you know Shore up bipartisan support because currently this is a justice. That's just too partisan and I can't go along with it Why didn't he say that back then? Why does he only invoke the bipartisan card when it comes to the Democratic Party's agenda? It's because he's just the Republican with a D in front of his name The D in front of his name is only there still because it really serves his power politics He loves being the one who kind of holds all the cards He loves having Democrats grovel at his feet and makes him feel important and makes him feel powerful He loves this but in actuality. He is functionally a Republican There is no meaningful difference between him and a moderate Republican the difference between him and Lisa Murkowski is essentially non-existent