The Most Powerful Man in Washington?
Slate News
Slate Podcasts
4.5 • 6K Ratings
🗓️ 10 February 2021
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
As soon as the Democrats won a slim 50-50 majority in the senate, the jokes about President Joe Manchin started flying. The Senate's self described “conservative Democrat” from West Virginia is in a key position to influence legislation during the Biden administration. How will he wield that power?
Guests: Jim Newell, senior politics reporter for Slate
Ken Ward Jr., co-founder of Mountain State Spotlight and distinguished reporting fellow for Pro-Publica
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | One of the key votes in the Senate joins us right now. |
| 0:08.5 | Democratic Senator from West Virginia, Joe Manchin. |
| 0:11.4 | Senator, welcome back to special report. |
| 0:12.6 | Thanks for having me, Brett. |
| 0:13.6 | Appreciate it. |
| 0:14.1 | When West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin showed up on Fox News last week, he was mostly |
| 0:19.1 | there to talk about Joe Biden's stimulus plan, how much |
| 0:22.6 | money he was willing to spend on it, whether he supported tacking a $15 minimum wage on the |
| 0:28.5 | back of it. He doesn't. But toward the end, the host asked him this question, it seemed like |
| 0:35.7 | he'd been waiting to put out there from the very |
| 0:38.3 | beginning. |
| 0:39.1 | I have 10 seconds here, Senator. |
| 0:40.5 | Are you the most powerful person in Washington? |
| 0:43.6 | Let me tell you something. |
| 0:45.0 | I've seen people who thought they had power and abused it. |
| 0:48.9 | I've seen the people that desired power and abused it. |
| 0:52.1 | And I've seen people that had an opportunity to be in a situation |
| 0:54.8 | where we can make a difference, and I hope I'm that person to make a difference to bring our |
| 0:58.3 | country together. You know what Joe Manchin didn't say when he answered this question? No. |
| 1:05.4 | So I asked Slate's Jim Newell to weigh in. Some people have said Joe Manchin's the most powerful man in Washington. |
| 1:14.5 | Are you buying that? |
| 1:16.9 | No. |
... |
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