‘I think, yes, I could bring it together,’ he said.
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said he will decide by the end of this year whether he plans to embark on a third-party bid for the White House.
The West Virginia Democrat faced questions about his third-party aspirations during an
interview with Fox News on Oct. 1, after he told host Shannon Bream that “people are not satisfied right now” with the current field of Democrat and Republican candidates.
“Why not have options?” Mr. Manchin said.
“A lot of people like you as an option,” Ms. Bream replied. “And you’ve said once you make a decision, a target will be on your back. So you’re waiting till the right time. But the fact is, the calendar is now going to start working against you. What is the timeline? Do you have any announcements to make this morning?”
Mr. Manchin replied that he didn’t have an announcement now, but he indicated that he’s open to running.
“I think, yes, I could bring it together,” he said.
The Fox News host again asked Mr. Manchin about his timeline.
“Well, I’ve said before the end of the year, I will,” Mr. Manchin replied. “We’re still planning.”
He will have to decide between a presidential run or whether to seek reelection to the Senate in 2024.
Manchin Sees Centrist Opening
Mr. Manchin signaled dissatisfaction with the increasing polarization of the Democratic and Republican parties and argued for a centrist candidate who could bridge the partisan gap.“There’s a lot of people that are basically in the center-left, center-right,” he said.
Mr. Manchin credited House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) for bucking a large portion of his own party to pass a continuing resolution over the weekend that temporarily funds the U.S. government and avoids a partial shutdown. The continuing resolution
garnered the support of 209 House Democrats and 126 House Republicans, with 90 House Republicans opposed.
“I praise Kevin McCarthy for what he did yesterday,” Mr. Manchin said. “He finally realized you can’t reason with unreasonable people, with the extremes.”
He indicated he doesn’t believe that former President Donald Trump, the Republican 2024 presidential front-runner, has the ability to govern from that centrist position. He also said President Joe Biden “used to be” in that centrist position but is no longer.
“We’re hoping maybe they'll come back to rational thinking that hey, it doesn’t work pushing everything to the extremes,” Mr. Manchin said. “This country does not run on the fringes. It never has and it can’t start now. So they’re either going to come back or we’re going to bring it back.”
Democrats Raise Alarm Over 3rd Parties
President Biden’s reelection campaign efforts could be blunted by challengers from both inside and outside his party. Environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and author Marianne Williamson have both opened campaigns for the 2024 Democratic presidential nomination, in challenges to President Biden, who would turn 82 before the start of a second term if he wins in 2024.Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) may also be considering challenging President Biden for the 2024 Democratic presidential nomination. Mr. Phillips has been calling for a younger candidate to lead the Democratic Party and, on Oct. 1,
stepped down from his leadership position in the House Democratic minority.
Talk of a third-party challenge, on the other hand, has some Democrats and their allies openly expressing concern.
“This is not the time to play around on the margins,” Democratic National Committee Chairman Jaime Harrison warned over the summer, according to reports.
David Axelrod, the chief strategist on President Barack Obama’s campaigns, has said Green Party candidate Cornel West could cut into Democrat vote totals, to the benefit of Republicans.
“In 2016, the Green Party played an outsized role in tipping the election to Donald Trump,” Mr. Axelrod wrote in a
post on X, formerly known as Twitter, in July. “Now, with Cornel West as their likely nominee, they could easily do it again. Risky business.”
Democrat-aligned groups such as MoveOn and Third Way began calling on elected officials to sign a
petition urging the “No Labels” to cease their efforts at setting up their own party, warning that such a party “would serve as a spoiler that could return someone like Donald Trump to office.” Mr. Manchin gave a keynote address at a No Labels town-hall-style event in July.
In May, Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, a Democrat, sent a cease-and-desist letter (
pdf) to No Labels, alleging the group deceived voters into changing their voter affiliations to No Labels when voters instead thought they were simply signing a ballot-access petition; No Labels has denied the allegation. Meanwhile, MoveOn began calling on election officials in other states to similarly scrutinize the No Labels movement’s ballot-access efforts, citing Ms. Bellows’s cease-and-desist letter.
