President Trump just signaled that he doesn’t need Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va. Not even a little bit.
Trump will return to West Virginia for a third visit, this time to rally for Manchin’s challenger, Republican Attorney General Patrick Morrisey. While the politicking isn’t unusual, the move is telling. It shows how little Trump values his relationship with the most moderate Democratic members of the Senate.
Of course, they could have been friends. Manchin represents a state Trump carried by 41 points and Manchin has cultivated a reputation as the sort of pragmatic centrist which Trump was expected to like. But things soured and a beautiful friendship never began because, as Trump told the New York Times, “Joe is a nice guy but he talks. But he doesn’t do anything.”
And so the Trump family has been doing a lot things to unseat Manchin. The president has made three visits to the state sending his son, Donald Trump Jr., when he can’t make the trip personally.
This makes sense because West Virginia obviously represents the best chance for Republicans to expand their Senate majority. This is especially interesting, though, because it shows how little stock Trump places in Manchin’s latest bipartisan overture.
Manchin was the first Democrat to sit down with Trump’s second Supreme Court nominee, Judge Brett Kavanaugh. He passed through his party’s own blockade to welcome the nominee for “a productive meeting.” It was a good sign for Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who will need Democratic support to get another conservative onto the court. But either the president didn’t notice or didn’t care.
While Trump can’t forget Manchin’s vote to confirm Judge Neil Gorsuch, Trump also hasn’t forgotten Manchin’s votes against tax reform and against repeal of Obamacare. He likes Manchin as a person, it seems. He would just like Manchin more if he was out of office.
The president will rally for Morrisey in Charleston on Aug. 21, little more than a month before Republicans hope to have Kavanaugh confirmed. It seems there isn’t anything Manchin can do to get back into the president’s good graces.
