Joy Reid Asks Democratic Senator: ‘What the Hell Can We Do About’ People Like Joe Manchin?
A clearly frustrated Joy Reid took a swipe at Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) on Tuesday night, and during an interview with one of his Democratic colleagues no less. Manchin has indicated he thinks at least some Republicans are willing to work with Democrats to get things done in the evenly divided U.S. Senate.
During the segment on MSNBC’s The ReidOut, the host noted a CNBC report revealing that the Koch family-backed Americans for Prosperity had specifically called on its activists to pressure Manchin into opposing portions of President Joe Biden’s agenda.
As part of a video series aimed at achieving this outcome, an official for the group says in one episode, “A wise man once said that it takes a lot of courage to stand up to your enemies but that it takes even more courage up to stand up to your friends.”
Later on, Reid asked Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) about the influence of lobbying groups and dark money in politics.
“Frankly,” said Whitehouse, “Democrats have had crap for countermeasures against it for a very long time. And it’s really hard to fight a group like that if you don’t take them seriously and take it on.”
Reid asked Whitehouse about Manchin directly.
So my question is, us little folks out here who are not multibillionaires, and who just want our planet to continue and want us to be a democracy, what the hell can we do about it when people like Manchin, who has an impoverished state that needs infrastructure, who’s got miners who are dying at age 50-something because they’re in the mines rather than being changed into green jobs–what do we do? If he doesn’t want to help, what do we do?
“You’ve got to demand transparency and fight back,” Whitehouse responded. “And call on leaders of the Democratic Party to ask what their countermeasures are against this big operation. It’s like the other side has an air force and we have none and we’re going to war.”
Reid asked the senator if he’s spoken about the matter with Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), who has also expressed optimism that Republicans will be willing to work with Democrats to pass important legislation.
“You know, not precisely,” said Whitehouse. “But I tell you what – when we go at the dark money thing, I’m confident that we will have them.”
Watch above via MSNBC
