Going with his gut: West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin talks Trump, partisanship and upcoming elections

Of course, he’d like your vote. But Manchin is more concerned with doing what he thinks is right than doing what he thinks will sway undecided voters.

“I tell people all the time, ‘If you’re looking for a yes person — I don’t care who the president is, man or woman, Republican or Democrat — I’m not that person,’” he said. “I always want to support my president, whoever he or she may be, but that’s not my job. Who’s my boss? I don’t work for the president — Article 1 and 2 of the Constitution are very clear — I work for the people of West Virginia.”

The veteran politician, who will face Republican challenger and West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey during the upcoming midterms, has long been considered one of Washington’s most centrist lawmakers.

Despite the “D” next to his name, Manchin is known as someone who is always willing to reach across the aisle and work with anyone to get things done.

To those who might not give him their support based on how he votes during Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the Supreme Court, Manchin offered an apology.

“I’m sorry you’re a one-issue voter,” he said.

In a state that overwhelmingly voted for Donald Trump in 2016, Manchin is one of West Virginia’s only high-profile Democrats. But he is far from being a “part of the resistance” or a “never-Trumper.”

In fact, Manchin said he has a strong working relationship with the president and a voting record to prove it.

“I voted almost 70 percent of the time with President Trump,” he said. “I’ve been deferential to the president. I’ve voted for most of his appointments — even the controversial ones — as long as they were qualified.”

Like when he voted against Trump’s pick for secretary of education, Betty DeVos, Manchin said.

“I voted against DeVos because she does not have a day of experience in the public school system and we’re asking her to oversee the largest education system in the world,” he said. “And I told Betsy, I said, ‘This is not personal. You’re being set up to fail because you don’t have that experience level in the public system.’ And I told them at the White House, I said, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t get there.’”

The Affordable Care Act (also known as Obamacare) is one issue where he and Trump have consistently failed to see eye to eye, Manchin said.

“I’ve told him, ‘You could be the Mr. Fixit president,’” Manchin said. “Why don’t we call it ‘Trump-Repaircare,’ because it definitely needs repaired. It’s not right. Right now, the Affordable Care Act, after nine years, 80 percent of West Virginians benefit by it. But 20 percent are getting screwed to the wall.”

Despite diverging on points of policy, Trump and he are friendly and have even socialized together, Manchin said.

When he was invited to attend a screening of the Winston Churchill biopic “Darkest Hour” at the White House, he and the president shared a few laughs and toured the building, Manchin said.

“He’s very accommodating, very gracious,” he said.

Manchin said he believes Trump is at heart a fellow centrist, who has been hamstrung and sidetracked by partisanship.

“I’ve said this to the president: ‘Mr. President, you’re the president of all the people. You’re not just the president of Republicans. If it wasn’t for Democrats you’d have never been elected.’ It was disgruntled, upset, ticked off Democrats who elected him. He knows that,” he said. “I think there’s a political group around him — and it might be coming out of the hardcore partisanship of the legislature, Mitch (McConnell) and some of them — and they keep pushing him further and further right. There’s not a more accommodating person who wants to find the middle, but as soon as you walk out of the room they push him right back.”

If Democrats end up with a majority in either legislative house after the upcoming elections, Trump will likely become more moderate on many issues, Manchin said.

“If the Democrats take either one, the House of the Senate, I think you’re going to see a different president,” he said. “I really do, that’s my gut.”

While he said the current political landscape is as bitterly divided along partisan lines as he has ever seen it in his lifetime, Manchin said he has never lost his zeal for the job or his love of serving his constituents.

“I must want to keep fighting or I wouldn’t be running,” he said. “It’s more challenging. I never look at it as discouraging. I’ve been around too damn long to get discouraged. It’s discouraging when it’s hopeless. We’re not hopeless yet.”