The Midmorning Refill: Will GOP lure Manchin, Nelson and Lieberman across the aisle?
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If you read one thing today . . .
The midterm elections might over but the GOP battle for the Senate is still going on strong. Remember Senator-elect Joe Manchin’s campaign commercial — the one where he’s shooting holes into Obama’s cap-and-trade legislation? Well, the GOP figures a guy who can handle a gun like that is on the wrong side of the aisle. According to a Fox News report, Republican leadership is offering Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, a choice committee position and support of a coal-to-diesel project in his home state.
Republicans believe Manchin is particularly susceptible to the overture because he is up for reelection in 2012 and will have to be on the ticket with President Obama, who is direly unpopular in West Virginia. Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Independent Joe Lieberman are the other two prime targets of Republican advances.
If Manchin, Nelson and Lieberman switched, it would leave the Senate in a 50-50 deadlock.
But Team Manchin, so far, is sticking with the campaign line that the two-term conservative governor is heading to Washington to change the way his party operates and to look for chances to work on bipartisan projects.