West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin sharply criticized his own party leader on Friday evening, calling Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid's reaction to Donald Trump's election "an absolute embarrassment to the Senate as an institution, our Democratic party, and the nation."
Manchin is one of the chamber's most conservative Democrats and must convince hundreds of thousands of Trump voters to reelect him in 2018. The outgoing Democratic leader, however, is one of Trump's most persistent critics and has spoken out against Trump on the Senate floor repeatedly this year. On Friday Reid called Trump a "sexual predator who lost the popular vote," perhaps the harshest reaction to Trump's victory uttered by a congressional Democratic this week.
Manchin said that Reid's remarks were "wrong!" and immediately moved to distance himself from the Democratic leader. Though Manchin voted against Reid as party leader in 2014, Manchin's criticisms of Reid were usually more mild than Friday's remarks.
"I want to be very clear, he does not speak for me. As difficult as it is for anyone to lose an election, the American people have spoken and Donald Trump is our President-elect. Senator Reid’s words needlessly feed the very divisiveness that is tearing this country apart," Manchin said. "We are Americans first, not Democrats or Republicans first. Unfortunately, there are some who forget that at times like these it is wrong to put party and politics above our country.”