A prominent US Democrat is withdrawing from the Senate, putting his party in political trouble. The Democratic Senator from the state of West Virginia, Joe Manchin, announced on Thursday in a video message on Platform X that he would not run for re-election next year. The 76-year-old has held his Senate seat for the past few years Democrats in the otherwise very Republican state.
His withdrawal puts the Democrats at risk of losing the Senate seat in the next election in early November 2024. They currently only have a slim majority in the Chamber of Congress. Manchin has regularly made headlines in recent years when he blocked plans by his party colleague, US President Joe Biden, in the Senate.
A new president will be elected in the United States on November 5, 2024. At the same time, all seats in the House of Representatives and a third of the seats in the Senate will be reallocated.
Democrats currently control 51 of 100 seats in the Senate. By the beginning of 2023, they had only occupied 50 seats there and were regularly dependent on US Vice President Kamala Harris, whose role is also President of the Senate, to vote in stalemate situations. Manchin used the situation many times to deviate from the party line, withhold his approval and thus sabotage several of Biden’s major projects. Because the Democrats later gained a seat, Manchin’s blocking potential recently shrank.
In his video message, Manchin said he wanted to travel the country in the future and continue to speak out “to find out whether there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle and bring Americans together.” He left it open what exactly that meant. In the summer he appeared at an event organized by the No Labels association, which indicated that it would put forward an independent candidate in the 2024 presidential election – Manchin was considered a possible top candidate.
A prominent US Democrat is withdrawing from the Senate, putting his party in political trouble. The Democratic Senator from the state of West Virginia, Joe Manchin, announced on Thursday in a video message on Platform X that he would not run for re-election next year. The 76-year-old has held his Senate seat for the past few years Democrats in the otherwise very Republican state.
His withdrawal puts the Democrats at risk of losing the Senate seat in the next election in early November 2024. They currently only have a slim majority in the Chamber of Congress. Manchin has regularly made headlines in recent years when he blocked plans by his party colleague, US President Joe Biden, in the Senate.