CV NEWS FEED // Sen. Joe Manchin, the outgoing senior U.S. Senator from West Virginia, announced he is leaving the Democratic Party and registering as an Independent on Friday.
Prior to Manchin’s announcement, political observers widely considered the lawmaker to be the most moderate Democrat in the Senate.
“My commitment to do everything I can to bring our country together has led me to register as an independent with no party affiliation,” Manchin wrote on X (formerly Twitter) Friday morning.
The senator accompanied his message with a picture of him holding a voter registration form.
Less than two hours later, Manchin followed up his announcement with a video explaining his decision.
“My commitment to my great country has been doing everything I can to make sure that we can survive as a representative form of democracy, a government … that the people are in control of, not the party systems,” he stated in the video.
“And today, for me to be able to fulfill that, I have changed my registration to being a no-party-affiliation Independent,” Manchin continued:
My reason for that, I can speak to both sides without having a brand, if you will. The brands have gotten so bad. If you have a “D” by your name, a Democrat, you’re supposed to hate Republicans. If you have an “R” by your name, you’re supposed to hate Democrats.
“I don’t hate either one,” he said. “And they’re not our enemies, each one are not the enemy.”
“The American brand is the brand that I carry the proudest,” he added. “I’m able to do that more by being a registered no-party-affiliate Independent than having a ‘D’ or an ‘R’ by my name.”
The Associated Press (AP) reported that despite Manchin’s move to break with his lifelong party, he “will continue to caucus with Democrats and keep his chairmanship” of the Senate Energy Committee.
Manchin announced last November that he will not seek re-election to his Senate seat.
“I believe in my heart of hearts that I have accomplished what I set out to do for West Virginia,” he said at the time.
Due to West Virginia’s status as a deep red state, Republican Gov. Jim Justice is heavily favored to win Manchin’s seat in November over the Democratic nominee, Manchin-endorsed Wheeling Mayor Glenn Elliott.
CatholicVote previously noted that “West Virginia is one of the most Republican states in the country. President Donald Trump carried it by a whopping 39% in 2020 and 42% in 2016.”
>> NOVEMBER: MANCHIN NOT SEEKING RE-ELECTION TO THE SENATE <<
CatholicVote reported last summer:
A self-professed Catholic, Manchin is currently the only person in the one-and-a-half-year history of CatholicVote’s Heroes and Zeroes to be named both a “hero” and a “zero.” On top of this, he received this distinction within a three-month span last year as a “hero” of February 2022 and a “zero” of May 2022.
“The senator holds a ‘C’ rating from the Catholic Accountability Project, indicating his truly mixed voting record,” CatholicVote’s August 2023 report continued:
While he voted for the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, the right for churches to stay open during COVID restrictions, no men in women’s sports, and penalties for late-term abortions, he also voted for the confirmation of Secretary Xavier Becerra, the so-called “Respect for Marriage Act” (widely called the “Disrespect for Marriage Act” by its critics), and to revive the pro-abortion “Equal Rights Amendment.”
