Vice President Kamala Harris promoted the Biden administration’s “critical” coronavirus “American rescue plan” this week in two interviews with local TV stations in West Virginia and Arizona.
But US Senator Joe Manchin, DW.Va., said he was surprised by Harris’s interview in his state, claiming that no one in the government had asked him to discuss his appearance, WSAZ-TV of Huntington, W. Go. .
The communication gap was a departure from the theme of national “unity” that Harris and President Biden promoted, he suggested.
“We will try to find a bipartisan way forward, but we need to work together,” said Manchin to the station. “This is not a way for us to work together.”
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Manchin, 73, who has represented West Virginia in the Senate since 2010 and previously served as its governor, is known for an independent trend that has often put him in conflict with national Democratic leaders.
Vice President Kamala Harris’s appearance on local TV in West Virginia was not well received by US Senator Joe Manchin, DW.Va.
With the Senate equally divided into 50 Republicans and 48 Democrats – in addition to the independent Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Angus King of Maine, who tend to side with Democrats – keep more free-thinking Democrats like Manchin and Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona in the group is seen as a key for the Biden government to advance its agenda.
It was not clear whether Harris’s interviews were designed to pressure Manchin and Sinema to support the American Rescue Plan. After the TV appearances, White House press secretary Jen Psaki was asked why the vice president chose to speak to local media in both states.
(Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of the USA, D-Ariz. (Getty Images))
“We want to present the case to the American people across the country … This is a way of doing just that,” said Psaki. She added that Harris would probably do more regional interviews in other states.
In his comments on TV, Harris explained the “urgency” of the $ 1.9 trillion plan that would provide an additional $ 1,400 in stimulus checks to Americans, expand unemployment insurance and increase the child tax credit.
When asked about the plan, Manchin said he believed that stimulus checks should go only to those in need, not to everyone.
“We want to help everyone who needs help,” said Manchin to WSAZ. “But if a person is earning $ 250,000 or $ 300,000, I don’t think he has as much need as a person who earns $ 40,000 or $ 50,000. We will achieve that.”
“We want to help everyone who needs help. But if a person is earning $ 250,000 or $ 300,000, I don’t think he has as much need as a person who earns $ 40,000 or $ 50,000.
Harris added that the plan would also give money to businesses and schools so that children could return safely, extend the eviction moratorium and create a national vaccine program, she told WSAZ.
A station reporter asked Harris why Trump’s many supporters, West Virginia, should trust the new government.
“Because we have faith in the American people,” she said. “We run as Democrats, but we are Americans and we will lead like Americans. We want our country to be strong, we want our country to be healthy, we want our children to prosper, and this is the end result. is doing this. “
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She also told interviewers in both states that President Biden believes that solving the climate change crisis and creating jobs complement each other.
“It is about investing in everything from manufacturing to make America a leader in electric vehicles to what we can do to invest in infrastructure and that is about jobs,” she told KNXV-TV in Phoenix. “Our plan includes what we will do to really invest in America’s workforce.”
She also said that the government wanted to work to help coal miners in West Virginia transfer their professional skills.
“All skilled workers who are in the coal industry and transferring these skills to what we need to do in terms of recovering abandoned landmines,” she told WSAZ.
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“What we need to do to plug leaks from oil and gas wells and transfer these important skills to the work that still needs to be done and needs to be done.”
She added to KNXV that the only way for all Americans to get the vaccine efficiently is “by having the resources to support governors like [Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican] to support the local population to get the resources … to have vaccines, vaccination centers. We have a whole plan in the American rescue plan that addresses a national vaccination program. “