During Tuesday night’s episode of The 11th Hour, MSNBC host Stephanie Ruhle showed a pre-recorded segment of her interview with Senator Joe Manchin (I-WV) and his daughter Heather Bresch at the Aspen Ideas Festival. Throughout the interview, Manchin explained his decision to leave the Democratic Party and called out the media as responsible for the drastic political polarization in the U.S.

Ruhle asked Manchin for his opinion on the root cause of political polarization, which the senator insisted was the fault of “you all,” meaning the media. In response, the host shouted a censored expletive and told the senator, “Wrong answer!” 

However, Manchin stood his ground and suggested that “You all should be paying Donald Trump royalties. You have him on every minute of every day, all day long, seven days a week.” He also chided Ruhle and pointed out that the news has the “ability to sensationalize bad behavior”, adding that “it used to be if it bleeds it reads, and now if it's sensational, you put it on.”

 

 

“I can't take it anymore, I turn on Life Below Zero up in Alaska just to get through the night,” Manchin joked.

Manchin illustrated the disunity in American politics as the direct result of the “toxic” weaponization of the Republican and Democratic parties:

You know, if you’re on one side you’re supposed to hate the other. But if you're a Democrat you’re supposed to hate Republicans, if you’re a Republican you’re supposed to hate Democrats. I don't hate anybody. They’re all my friends and I thought, well, the best way to love both of them, be an independent and talk to both of them.

He also revealed that even though he had always identified as a Democrat out of loyalty to his grandfather, he never “subscribed” to either side and disagreed with certain issues regardless of the party. “I have never looked at politics as far as a partisan issue or Democrat, Republican. Never have,” he affirmed.

Manchin expressed his disappointment with the devolvement of the Democrat Party and its aggressive shift to the far-left. Furthermore, he told Ruhle that it reached a point where it was impossible for him to continue to defend Democratic policies to his home state of West Virginia and doing so would be a violation of his core principles:

Yeah, went too far to the left for me, basically, to go home and defend. I’ve always said this, you know, you are who you are, no matter where you were raised, how you were raised, and who raised you. No matter what station in life you are today–God bless everybody–but you still think about how you were raised, where you were raised, and who raised you. And can you go back home and talk to them? Well, if I can’t go home and explain it, I can’t vote for it. I can't support it. And it moves so far to the left, there's a lot of things I could not vote for or support.

For her part, Bresch outlined a comprehensive plan to increase political involvement for independent voters and allow for “more responsible representation”:

But if we opened primaries and gave the ability to have ranked choice or immediate runoff in the general election, I think it is the most proven way to level the playing field of parties. It's not saying you’re anti-party. You get one ballot for a primary, you see Republican, Independent, Democratic candidates, you vote for one. Then the top four, the top five go to the general election and you rank the order of whom you like…We know that it allows more people the opportunity to get involved and it allows more responsible representation.

Towards the end of the segment, Ruhle essentially proved his point about the media by repeatedly pressing Manchin for a Joe Biden endorsement, though he refused to submit to the pressure and declared his intention to pull the president back to the center. “I think those of us who’ve known Joe Biden for a long time would like to see the Joe Biden we've known,” he stated.

The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read:

MSNBC’s The 11th Hour

6/25/2024

11:37:48 PM EST

[Cuts to video]

STEPHANIE RUHLE: You know, I'm going to start with the obvious question, Senator. What made you decide to make this move, what couldn’t you do as a Democrat in office, that made you make this decision just a few months ago?

SEN. JOE MANCHIN (I-WV): Well, both brands have become so toxic because they’ve basically been weaponized. You know, if you’re on one side you’re supposed to hate the other. But if you're a Democrat you’re supposed to hate Republicans, if you’re a Republican you’re supposed to hate Democrats. I don't hate anybody. They’re all my friends and I thought, well, the best way to love both of them, be an independent and talk to both of them because...

RUHLE: And do you think that's how they took it?

MANCHIN: Well, let me just say this. Not having a brand and you’re speaking to them, they’re not looking at you through colored–rose-colored glasses like you’re trying to pull something over on them. They know me well enough. But it’s with that it’s made it hard. 

There's a lot of things I didn't agree with and there’s a lot–and someone said “Why don’t you be a Republican?” Well, there's a lot of things I don't agree with on the Republican side. But what happens is that you get to Washington and you got to pick a side. Well, I never subscribed to that, even though I had a “D” by my name all my life. 

They said, “Why are you Democrat?” I said, “Well, I guess my grandfather was very [impressed with?] FDR back in the coal mining days of 1930’s of West Virginia–kinda gave him a start and helped him and everything–so, out of loyalty, you know, I never thought anything. 

I have never looked at politics as far as a partisan issue or Democrat, Republican. Never have.

RUHLE: Did you feel like you couldn’t be a Democrat representing West Virginia or did you feel like the Democratic Party went too far to the left…

MANCHIN: Went too far.

RUHLE: …for Joe Manchin.

MANCHIN: Yeah, went too far to the left for me, basically, to go home and defend. I’ve always said this, you know, you are who you are, no matter where you were raised, how you were raised, and who raised you. No matter what station in life you are today–God bless everybody–but you still think about how you were raised, where you were raised, and who raised you. And can you go back home and talk to them? Well, if I can’t go home and explain it, I can’t vote for it. I can't support it. And it moves so far to the left, there's a lot of things I could not vote for or support.

[Transition]

RUHLE: Heather, you call the silent majority, the sensible majority and I believe a lot of people here aren't the disaffected voter but they are part of the sensible majority who thinks, “I guess the system doesn't work,” but they want it to. So let's get practical on what has to get done.

HEATHER BRESCH: Yeah. So, I think, as you said, we all recognize it's broken, how can we fix it? Or, there's tangible steps to take and I think there is hope and a light at the end of the tunnel. 

So, after kinda diving deep, it became very clear, the point dad was just making, there is zero infrastructure in Washington, D.C., for anybody that wants to be center-right, center-left, or an independent. There's no place to come have a cup of coffee with Senator Manchin, or Senator Murkowski, or Senator Romney, if you’re Jared Golden or Marie Perez, that want to stay moderate, to have help writing op-eds, to have just infrastructure, fundraising, that the parties offer. Not just the parties, but I'm talking almost college campuses, for dinner, for all your needs. So, there's a huge vacuum white space there. So, that is needed to be filled, for sure, a center for the center. I think structurally, it's totally nonpartisan. 

But if we opened primaries and gave the ability to have ranked choice or immediate runoff in the general election, I think it is the most proven way to level the playing field of parties. It's not saying you’re anti-party. You get one ballot for a primary, you see Republican, Independent, Democratic candidates, you vote for one. Then the top four, the top five go to the general election and you rank the order of whom you like. We know it moderates, we know that's the only reason Senator Murkowski is in the Senate, from Alaska. We know that it allows more people the opportunity to get involved and it allows more responsible representation.

[Transition]

RUHLE: How did we become so polarized? Was it our politicians that saw the–

MANCHIN: To me, it's you all.

RUHLE: Oh, [Bleep], wrong answer!

BRESCH: That's funny.

RUHLE: But that could be, right? Is it media, is it politicians, or is it the American people? Like, what is the root cause of it?

MANCHIN: You all should be paying Donald Trump royalties. 

RUHLE: Yeah.

MANCHIN: You have him on every minute of every day, all day long, seven days a week.

[Applause]

BRESCH: But let me–I guess I’ll say this…

RUHLE: Hold on a minute. Like, I get that that gets applause.

BRESCH: Before we get to…

RUHLE: Ready? 

MANCHIN: (Laughs).

RUHLE: Hold on. He's a former president of the United States, who just sat at a criminal trial and was convicted of 34 felonies. What do you think should be on the news?

[Input from audience]

BRESCH: They’re saying back in 2015, 2016.

MANCHIN: Whenever. I’m just saying this. The bottom line is, you all have the ability to sensationalize bad behavior, okay? Because it used to be if it bleeds it reads, and now if it's sensational, you put it on.

RUHLE: There’d be nothing to sensationalize if the behavior wasn’t bad.

MANCHIN: I know. But I’m just saying, I gotta–I can't take it anymore, I turn on Life Below Zero up in Alaska just to get through the night.

RUHLE: (Laughs).

[Transition]

RUHLE: Help us understand who that West Virginia voter is because it's in your state where you’ve seen that anger, where you saw all of the support, you know those grievance voters. 

MANCHIN: Right.

RUHLE: Where did that come from, and where did your party miss the mark so much? Because, again, before politics, it's about respect and dignity?

MANCHIN: The West Virginia Democrats felt like the returning Vietnam veteran. We have done every–taken every order you have given us and we've done everything you asked. We never said no, we did the heavy lifting, and now we’re not good enough, clean enough, bright enough, smart enough. You don’t want us at all, you’ve just thrown us to the side. They just flip continuously. 

So, I will say this about Joe Biden. He took that to heart and I said, “Mr. President, you cannot leave anybody behind.” So, we wrote some of these bills that we have, the REA [inaudible] and some of them. We have done that, where you get a boost if you go into an area where that–we’re not using the resources anymore, whether it be coal or different things. Those areas have to be able to–be able to sustain themselves. And that wasn’t done. That's how we flipped so quick. We didn’t ever flip that quick. It's never been done in our history of our country.

RUHLE: So, are you voting for him in November?

MANCHIN: Who?

RUHLE: Joe Biden, who you just…

MANCHIN: No, I voted for him–no, I voted for him last time. 

RUHLE: No. Will you vote for him this November?

MANCHIN: I’m gonna be voting. I'm trying to bring my buddy back to the middle. I'm just working hard. Pulling him back.

RUHLE: And, so, you will vote for him?

MANCHIN: I’m gonna be pulling him back to the middle. 

[Laughs]

MANCHIN: I said, I love my country too much to vote for Donald Trump. And I know–I know Donald real well but I just think that, you know, the transfer–orderly transfer of power, the rule of law, the love we should have for our judicial system, it's still the best in the world and he tried to basically just destroy those two. It's just–it’s more than I can take. But with that…

[Applause]

MANCHIN: …but with that, but with that, I think those of us who’ve known Joe Biden for a long time would like to see the Joe Biden we've known.

(...)