Joe Manchin Kills Build Back Better During Fox News Appearance

During an appearance on Fox News Sunday, Senator Joe Manchin officially announced that he would not support the Build Back Better Act. Just days prior to this, Bernie Sanders said that Manchin (and Sinema) were acting like Republicans, and the fact that Manchin chose Fox as the outlet to unveil his betrayal lends even more credibility to Bernie's assessment. Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins explains what happens now.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

Well folks, it is official now, Democratic Senator Joe Manchin announced of course on Fox news yesterday that build back better was dead. That he, even though he had gone through it a million times in his head, had tried to work out all the numbers. He just can't bring himself to vote for this piece of legislation. So without his vote the Democrats do not have the 50 needed to pass it and it is officially dead. Now Chuck Schumer, Democratic Senate majority leader came out last night and said, listen, we're still gonna try to revive this early next year. So, you know, don't worry, we're gonna continue working on this. But at this point, what's the point? Joe Manchin is not gonna be on board with this. Joe Manchin has bought into those Republican lies about the bill, you know, based on that faulty CBO score that the Republicans got by submitting a bill that wasn't the build back better bill.

It included provisions that were not in build back better. It had some provisions extended that were not in fact extended in build back better. So the score that Republicans got from the CBO was not accurate. But Joe Manchin is using those inaccurate numbers to justify his opposition to this piece of legislation. Then of course, in a statement released by his office, he also mentions something that really gives away the game here. He said, one of the things he doesn't like about it is that it transitions us to renewable energy just too darn fast. Yeah. The man who owns a stake in a failing coal company is worried that we're moving too quickly to renewable energy. That is one of the biggest reasons Joe Manchin is not going to support this legislation. Joe Manchin will do nothing that gets us closer to renewable energy when his financial interests tell him otherwise.

Kind of, kind of a good example there of why senators and members of Congress shouldn't be allowed to own stocks. They shouldn't be allowed to own companies. If you want to be a public servant, go be a public servant. You have to give everything else up. I mean, hell when Jimmy Carter became president and I know I haven't said this in a while, he had to sell his peanut farm to avoid any potential conflicts of interest. So why are we not holding our other elected officials to that same high standard? Hell, we haven't even been holding presidents to that same standard since Jimmy Carter. It is what it is. The legislation is dead and Democrats are now officially doomed for 2022. I'm not gonna sugar coat it. I am gonna act a bit like a doomsayer at the moment because that's what's going to happen as a result of this. Even with the passage and signing of that infrastructure bill, many of the funding mechanisms for it were actually contained in build back better.

That's why the two bills were originally paired together. That's why you had the progressives in the House, you know, members of the squad say, we're not voting for infrastructure without build back better. And they voted against it. They look really prescient right now don't they? Because they were correct. They warned us if we decouple the infrastructure bill from build back better, then build back better will never see the light of day. It will never pass. And they were correct. And of course you have the other liberals on social media telling us don't blame Joe Manchin for this. Why isn't anybody talking about the 50 Republicans who also voted against it?