one of those is west virginia senator
joe manchin he joins us tonight senator
thanks for being here
thanks for having me brett you know a
lot of focus
now on those georgia runoffs and
potentially
if it all adds up tom tillis wins in
north carolina dan sullivan in alaska it
looks like those two races
could be the control of the u.s senate
with
a tie then going to vice president
harris what do you tell people about
that and concern about that concern
considering all we've heard about the
progressive agenda well there's a lot of
people that are concerned there's a lot
of fear tactics are being used right now
brett
if both of the georgia senators were
elected from
the democratic party then that would be
50 50 if
both dan sullivan and tom tillis win 50
50 means there's a tie
but if one senator does not vote on a
democratic side there is no tie
and there is no bill so i commit to you
tonight and i commit to all of your
viewers and everyone else that's
watching
i want to lay those fears i'm going to
rest those fears for you right now
because
when they talk about whether it be
packing the courts or ending the
filibuster i will not vote to do that
i will not vote to pack the courts i
think and i will not vote to end the
filibuster
brett this system the senate was so
unique body in the world
it was made to work together in a
bipartisan way and once you start
breaking down those barriers
then you lose every every reason that we
are the institution that we are the most
deliberate body
so i want to re lay those fears to rest
that that won't happen because
i will not be the 50th democrat voting
to end that
filibuster or to basically uh blo stack
the court
and then all the other things you're
hearing about brett also is
defund the police i don't know of any of
the democrats in the caucus
that are for defunding the police we're
not for that whatsoever
and when they talk about basically
medicare for all
we can't even pay for medicare for some
doesn't make any sense at all
we've got to fix the affordable care act
we have and i think our republican
moderate republicans will work with us
to now repair what needs to be repaired
let me just clarify here senator you're
saying definitively tonight
that even if democrats take control and
chuck schumer becomes the senate
majority leader
that they try to break the filibuster
say the filibuster's over
you will definitively vote against that
absolutely
i will vote against that they i've been
very clear about that
i'm the only democrat senator that has
voted against the filibuster butchers
but the nuclear option
that harry reid did in 2013 and i voted
against
the nuclear option when mitch mcconnell
did it
in 2017 for the supreme court i thought
we should be working together it should
take a minimum of 60.
and that means you're going to have to
have a few democrats or republicans
depending on who's in the majority
to work together that's what we're all
about
why would you break that down and
there's no need to have the senate
all right so there's some republicans
who will say to you i don't buy it
there's going to be too much pressure on
you chuck schumer is going to come hard
and he's going to say
i'll give you a chairmanship of xyz and
they're going to come hard to get that
vote you voted
some key votes against amy coney
barrett's confirmation you said you
didn't like the process if i remember
right
you said she was qualified but you voted
against her you voted against the 500
billion dollar coveted relief bill you
said it wasn't big enough
but if you were a republican you would
have voted for it you voted for the
justice act
the tim scott bill and for the usmca
but if you're a republican and then you
look at you
neil i mean brett i voted for neil
gorsuch i voted for brett kavanaugh
i was against this process because never
in the history of the united states of
america
have we ever confirmed a supreme court
justice
when a vacancy happened between july and
november and i've been very clear about
that i voted for amy comey barrett
for the 17th circuit i'm not going to
break precedent
so if i can take that type of pressure
if i can vote for brett kavanaugh
the only democrat if i can take that
type of pressure
you don't think i can basically justify
what i'm going to be doing
and how i'm going to vote knowing that
i'm sitting in the seat that robert c
byrd held who wrote the rules of the
senate
this is an institution you wouldn't
become a republican
you don't need more whether you're dnr
right i'm
i'm a proud moderate conservative
democrat maybe there's not many of us
left but i can tell you this country
wants a moderation
this country you run your life you run
your business from the middle not from
the fringes
and that's where i've always been so for
something whatever the message was it
was wrong
for this many people to be split for us
not to be able to have a message that
didn't scare the bejesus out of people
and when you're talking about basically
green new deal and all this socialism
that's not who we are as a democratic
party it's not how i was raised in west
virginia
it's not the democrats i know but yet
we've been tagged if you ever be by your
name you must be for all the crazy stuff
and i'm not
i'm going to play a sound bite here this
is you talking about the trump tax cuts
and now the president-elect joe biden
okay the bottom line is the president
started out the conversation this is not
a tax cut for the rich
myself nor any of the one percentage are
going to get tax cuts
this is going to be about mainstream
about us creating an opportunity
stimulating this economy being globally
competitive he does take advantage of
the tax code that's why
i'm going to eliminate the trump tax
cuts
so as a democrat would you vote to
eliminate the trump taxes
there are some adjustments that need to
be made there's been adjustments all
along that need to be made i was against
when he went to 21
i said mr president please for every one
percent that you reduce
from 35 down to 21. i says
25 would be a great place for us to stop
and we'd be very competitive in the
superpower of the world
for every one percent of that of the uh
taxing
uh it's 100 billion dollars brad
100 billion dollars corporate tax one
percent and i said sir we can't give
away that much
we sub obligation brett as of this
morning we're over 27 trillion dollars
27 trillion dollars of debt never before
have we amassed this much debt
in this short of a time other than world
war ii
so we've got to get our financial house
in order and nobody has talked about
that
nobody but we don't need to do that it's
not an issue in this election
let me ask you one last thing senator
and we appreciate your time what's the
message
to your party as you look at the split
in the country 71 million people plus
said
we want donald trump's vision for the
country what's the message for your
party
that you take from this election well
the message from my party is that look
at the
look at the individual look at the
people running whether it be in georgia
are they do they understand
the uh the farmers they understand rural
georgia they understand basically the
health care needs of rural america
in this country has been split right now
down the middle between rural and urban
and it's getting further divides getting
further and further i come from the
rural part of this country
my whole state is rural and i guarantee
you one thing you've got to scrap to
survive and these are hard-working
people
they felt like they were left behind no
one was listening to them
and i think we can bring that back
together basically as we do an energy
policy
you have to have be independent energy
independent in this country you can't
eliminate certain things we're going to
use fossil when it's clean as fashion
we're going to be basically moving
towards renewables we can do all of that
but you have to use everything you have
but you can't leave an area behind and
the coal market goes out you've got to
be able to bring other different
opportunities
to the people in the hard-working areas
that built this to build america and
build the country
that's what we're working on we are
still a party
that has compassion we are still a party
that has sympathy and empathy
we have to work together but you know
one thing my republican friends
are these are all good people can't we
work together we might have a different
idea of
how to fix a problem but we can work
together to try to solve them rather
than basically blaming each other and
that's what's happened to america
sandra we appreciate your time i bet
some democrats are doing some math after
your comments uh tonight and uh
thanks a lot we'll see what goes forward
well we're not gonna we're not going to
run this country we're going to bring
this country together
thank you senator