Progressive Perspectives on Sen. Joe Manchin’s Refusal to Support “Build Back Better”

Yesterday Joe Manchin, the Democratic West Virginia senator, announced that he could not support President Joe Biden’s $2.2 trillon “Build Back Better” legislative package.

As Ross Barkan notes in The Guardian, “Biden and other Senate Democrats had spent most of 2021 trying to get Manchin, a conservative Democrat, to vote for a bill that would dramatically bolster the social safety net, combat climate change and raise taxes on corporations.” Without Manchin, Senate Democrats do not have enough votes to pass the landmark legislation, which has already been approved by the House.

Following is a compilation of responses by progressives to Sen. Manchin’s refusal to support, and thus effectively “kill,” the much needed and overwhelmingly popular “Build Back Better” agenda.

_____________________

I think what Sen. Manchin did yesterday represents such an egregious breach of trust of the President. . . . It’s an outcome [progressives] had warned about. . . . [The political situation is] not beyond repair [and the Democratic leadership needs to start using] a very large number of tools at their disposal. It’s really about time that we take the kid gloves off and we start using [these tools] to govern for working families.

– Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY)
Quoted in Andrea Germanos's article,
“AOC to Democratic Leaders: Time to
‘Take the Kid Gloves Off’ With Manchin”
Common Dreams
December 20, 2021

Let’s be clear: Manchin’s excuse is bullshit. The people of West Virginia would directly benefit from childcare, pre-Medicare expansion, and long term care, just like Minnesotans. This is exactly what we warned would happen if we separated Build Back Better from infrastructure.

– Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN)
Quoted in the Common Dreams staff article,
“‘Bullshit’: Manchin Called Out for
Killing Biden’s Build Back Better”
Common Dreams
December 20, 2021

If Sen. Joe Manchin wants to vote against the Build Back Better Act, he should have the opportunity to do so with a floor vote as soon as the Senate returns. He should have to explain to West Virginians and the American people why he doesn’t have the courage to stand up to powerful special interests and lower prescription drug costs; expand Medicare to cover dental, hearing and eyeglasses; continue the $300 per child direct monthly payment which has cut childhood poverty by over 40%; and address the devastating impacts of climate change. He should also have to explain why he is not prepared to demand that millionaires and large corporations start paying their fair share of taxes.

I also find it amusing that Sen. Manchin indicates his worry about the deficit after voting just this week for a military budget of $778 billion, four times greater than Build Back Better over ten years and $25 billion more than the president requested.

– Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT)
Quoted in the Common Dreams staff article,
“‘Bullshit’: Manchin Called Out for
Killing Biden’s Build Back Better”
Common Dreams
December 20, 2021

This is about Joe Manchin obstructing the president’s agenda, obstructing the people’s agenda . . . torpedoing our opportunity to advance unprecedented advancements to address the hurt that this pandemic-induced recession has caused and to get this pandemic under control. . . . All I want for Christmas is a senator that has compassion for the American people and not contempt.

– Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass)
Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union program
December 20, 2021

[Sen. Manchin is] beholden to his donors. He’s beholden to dark money. And he’s beholden to special interests. And by “dark money,” we mean big donors that cannot be tracked or traced.

And special interests have been heavily involved in the negotiation process for Build Back Better throughout this entire year. The pharmaceutical lobby has spent more money lobbying this year than it ever has in its history – hundreds of millions of dollars. Senator Manchin has raised more money this year than he ever has in his career. So has Senator Sinema, by the way.

So we’re not talking about senators who are responding to the needs of their people. West Virginia has the seventh-highest child poverty rate in the country. West Virginia has horrible climate conditions that need to be addressed. Senator Manchin is not talking about the people of West Virginia or the people of America; he’s talking – he’s responding to big special interests and his donors.

. . . [T]his is a senator who believes that this is okay, that this is business as usual and there’s no problem at all with his family benefiting from investments in and payments from the pharmaceutical lobby.

Unfortunately, he is not the only one. Many of my colleagues in the House and the Senate think it’s okay for big money to continue to control how Congress behaves. You know, this is capitalism. Many of my colleagues are capitalists, and they celebrate this, and they are completely okay with this. . . . [T]hey’re okay with Citizens United. They’re okay with corporations being designated as people and money being designated as free speech. This is the problem with Washington.

And as we build back better in an equitable way and work together to save our democracy, we have to look special interests and big money directly in the face and deal with it and change how we do business in Washington. We cannot have a democracy with this level of inequality and this behavior happening in Washington. We just had an insurrection on January 6th, partly because we have a system that allowed someone like Donald Trump to get to the White House in the first place. And now we have 20 million, at least, people . . . across the country, ready to fight for, you know, their liberties and freedoms as white nationalists.

So, this is all connected and correlated, and Manchin is representative of all of that, as well as of an old patriarchy that doesn’t want to support women getting back to work, particularly women of color, doesn’t want to support paid leave, doesn’t want to support universal child care and all the things that would benefit historically marginalized and disenfranchised people.

– Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY)
Speaking on Democracy Now!
December 20, 2021

Senator Manchin, along with half of the Senate, is squandering the narrow window left to avert a climate catastrophe. These members of Congress are choosing to put their heads in the sand knowing full well that climate-fueled wildfires, heatwaves, droughts, and flooding keep getting worse. If we maintain our current course, climate change will take more lives, exact untold harm to public health and devastate the economy. Instead, now is the time to embrace a clean energy future with all the economic and health benefits it will bring.

Shame on Senator Manchin for his about-face. Like the rest of the country, communities in West Virginia are being hit hard by climate change, with some of the highest flood risk in the nation. If he succeeds in killing this bill, his constituents, many of whom are struggling, wouldn’t see social safety net programs, such as childcare and Medicare coverage, expanded. Given the senator’s financial stakes in coal, this is perhaps an indication of where his true allegiances lie.

The Build Back Better Act is a critical step to tackling climate change, addressing long-standing environmental injustices and ensuring that working people and families across the nations are treated fairly. Senator Manchin and the Senate need to get this done.

– Johanna Chao Kreilick
President, Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS)
December 20, 2021

Related Off-site Links:
Displaying “Inhuman Disdain” for Working Families, Manchin Said Child Tax Credit Would Be Used for Drugs – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, December 20, 2021).
Progressives Demand Floor Vote to Spotlight Manchin’s “Contempt” for His Constituents – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, December 20, 2021).
Joe Biden Must Use His Presidential Powers to Deliver on His Promises – Ros Barkan (The Guardian, December 20, 2021).
As World Burns, Climate Campaigners Denounce Manchin as “Fossil-Fueled Sociopath” – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, December 20, 2021).
U.S. Coal Miners’ Union Asks Manchin to “Revisit” Opposition to Spending Bill – Valerie Volcovici (Reuters, December 20, 2021).

UPDATE: Progressives Hand Biden List of 55 Executive Actions Because “Working People Can't Wait” – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, March 17, 2022).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Colin Taylor on the “Moral Obscenity” of Obstructionist Democrats Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema
• Rep. Ilhan Omar: Quote of the Day – October 28, 2021
• Will Democrats Never Learn?

Image: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York remains in her seat as Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia stands and applauds as President Donald Trump delivers his second State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress at the US Capitol on February 5, 2019.(Photo: Jonathan Ernst / Reuters)