Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., could be looking to drop being a Democrat and run as an independent for president in 2024 after holding meetings with former President Bill Clinton and other allies, The Washington Post reported.
The meetings show Manchin in a state of political flux as he tries to map out his future.
He was considering three different options, including retirement, running for reelection as an independent, or going for the presidency in 2024 with the No Labels party, which he headlined during an event in July with former Utah GOP Gov. John Huntsman.
"We're here to make sure that the American people have an option," Manchin told the event. "And the option is, can you move the political parties off their respective sides? They've gone too far right, too far left."
Manchin's daughter, former pharmaceutical CEO Heather Bresch, urged her father to run under the No Labels banner, according to the Post.
But Clinton advised the senator against an independent run for the Oval Office during a private meeting in the Hamptons during the Labor Day holiday weekend, sources told the Post.
Clinton was concerned a run would only serve to bolster former President Donald Trump's bid to unseat Democrat President Joe Biden in a 2024 rematch from 2020.
Manchin, who has served in the Senate as a Democrat since 2010, rose to national prominence for his more moderate stances in representing a conservative state like West Virginia, which is heavily dependent on the coal industry.
His vote was critical in several pieces of legislation due to an even 50-50 split in the upper chamber requiring each party voting in lockstep for anything to get through the body.
"I'm thinking seriously what's best for me; I have to have peace of mind, basically," the Post reported he said about the decision to become an independent. "I've been thinking about that for quite some time."
If he does leave the Democratic Party, he will be the second Senator to do so in the last year after Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., switched to independent in December 2022.
Charles Kim ✉
Charles Kim, a Newsmax general assignment writer, is an award-winning journalist with more than 30 years in reporting on news and politics.
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