West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin said Thursday he is comfortable with his decision to skip out on a meeting with other Democrats and President Obama on Wednesday, and to instead meet with Vice President-elect Mike Pence.
Manchin said on Fox News his short meeting with Pence on Capitol Hill to talk about reforms to the Affordable Care Act was more in line with how Congress should work than Obama’s meeting with Democrats or Pence’s meeting with Republicans. He said lawmakers need to work across the aisle, not behind closed doors with members of the same party.
“We had a great dialogue, start to build relationships,” Manchin said of the meeting.
Manchin said Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was OK with him skipping the meeting because Manchin’s role in the Democratic conference is to be one of the avenues of discussion with Republicans.
Manchin said he’s been tasked with building a relationship with the incoming Trump administration, Senate Republicans and House Republicans because they see him as an honest broker. Without bipartisanship, especially on the issue of Obamacare, lawmakers are no longer working for their constituents back home, he said.
“The Democrats passed it in 2009 … with no Republicans, all Democrats, and that was divisive,” he said. “Now, Republicans want to repeal it with no Democrats. That’s just as bad.”
He added that both sides vilifying each other in the early stages of the 115th Congress doesn’t give him much hope going forward.
“I’ve been around this town for six years now and I’ve seen the horrible rhetoric, the toxic rhetoric, that comes from both sides,” he said. “We’ve gotta have adults in the room.”
