West Virginia Can’t Wait Movement Raising Money to Challenge ‘The Manchin Machine’ in 2022, 2024, and Beyond
West Virginia – In recent weeks, the national press has called Sen. Joe Manchin a “kingmaker,” “the most valuable Democrat,” and the “king of the Senate.” Today, a bi-partisan coalition of West Virginia voters are instead calling for his ouster.
WV Can’t Wait is “a movement to win a people’s government in the Mountain State.” Launched in 2019, the group recruited, trained, and backed 101 candidates for office in West Virginia. They supported Democrats, Independents, Republicans, and third party candidates — so long as they refused corporate donations, promised never to cross a picket line, and signed on to their New Deal for West Virginia — a comprehensive policy platform that was crowdsourced at 197 Town Halls. Read more about WV Can’t Wait’s track record in The Forge, The Intercept, and Newsweek.
Now the group has launched the website ReplaceJoeManchin.Com to raise money to replace Senator Joe Manchin and his statewide political “machine.”
“The only hope to persuade a West Virginia politician is to fight like hell to replace them,” said WV Can’t Wait Co-Chair Katey Lauer. “Manchin’s network of corporate lawyers, financiers, coal and gas executives, lobbyists, and party bosses will not be defeated in one election, or in one race. This is a guy who has weekly check-in calls with Exxon. It took a generation for his machine to rise to power. It may take a generation for us to replace it. The threat we build must be fearless, homegrown, and permanent. We have to start at the root. And we have to start now. ”
In addition to recruiting, vetting, and supporting a candidate to run for Manchin’s Senate seat in 2024, WV Can’t Wait will use the funds they raise to build local political infrastructure that lasts beyond one election cycle. That includes:
Going “deep” – running slates of pro-labor, no-corporate-cash candidates in key municipal and county elections in 2022
Statewide support – organizing candidate trainings and direct support for dozens more of individual rural candidates across the state, up and down the ballot
Defending the 14 seats won by WV Can’t Wait candidates in 2020 & 2021, and offering those elected officials the policy, communications, and basic support they need to govern.
Providing on-going training and funding for mutual aid organizers and citizen journalists who are challenging the political and media establishment in their own communities.
Recent polls have suggested that Manchin’s positions (on minimum wage, voting rights, etc.) are out of step with his constituents. His popularity in-state has also hovered below 50 percent. That’s no surprise to WV Can’t Wait organizers. Manchin is a long-time ALEC member, whose top donors are corporate lawyers and banking interests.
“You don’t win high office in West Virginia because you’re a servant of the people,” said WV Can’t Wait Co-Chair and former Gubernatorial Candidate Stephen Smith. “You win by being rich, or because your daddy was a politician. We’re out to change that.”
The website launches Tuesday, August 17th at 9:00am. On the site, people can take action by making a donation OR by nominating someone in their community to run for office. WV Can’t Wait staff will follow-up with each of those potential candidates — offering individual coaching and an invitation to upcoming candidate info sessions and trainings.