Manchin won't endorse Harris after calling for change to Senate rule

Sen. Joe Manchin said on Tuesday he will not endorse Vice President Kamala Harris for president after she said in a radio interview that the Senate should eliminate the filibuster to codify abortion rights nationally.

By getting rid of the filibuster, the number of votes needed to codify abortion rights would decrease from 60 to 51.

“Shame on her,” Manchin told CNN . “She knows the filibuster is the Holy Grail of democracy. It’s the only thing that keeps us talking and working together. If she gets rid of that, then this would be the House on steroids.”

Manchin, a former Democrat who became an independent earlier this year, is not running for reelection in West Virginia. It is expected that Republican Jim Justice will win the seat held by Democrats continuously since 1959.

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Under Harris' proposal, lawmakers would codify the ruling made in Roe v. Wade, which essentially required states to allow access to abortions until a fetus is viable. Generally, states were barred from regulating abortions for the first 20 weeks of a pregnancy prior to a 2022 Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade. The ruling allowed numerous Republican-held states to enact near or total abortion bans.

Currently, there are 51 members of the Senate who caucus with Democrats.

Republicans are hoping to take seats from Democrats in Montana and Ohio, states expected to be won by former President Donald Trump. If the Senate ends up in a 50/50 tie, the vice president casts the tie-breaking vote.

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Democrats would also have to gain back seats in the House and take the majority from Republicans to enact such legislation.

Although several Republican senators, such as Sen. Lisa Murkowski, have expressed support for codifying abortion rights, they have opposed eliminating the Senate filibuster to do so.

Manchin has long resisted eliminating the filibuster for a number of issues, a stance that has angered and frustrated many Democrats. He wrote an opinion piece in 2021 vowing not to get rid of the filibuster.

Harris revealed her thoughts on the filibuster in an interview with Wisconsin Public Radio.