Manchin: Trump will help on miners’ fight

Sen. Joe Manchin said Monday that President-elect Donald Trump supports a permanent fix on miners’ healthcare benefits, giving a boost to a key issue for the West Virginia Democrat.
“He wants to help coal miners,” Manchin said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “I wanted to make sure. I wanted to look at him and talk to him and make sure we are on the same path.”
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has also called finding a fix on miners’ healthcare benefits a top priority.
Manchin is increasingly positioning himself ahead of his reelection as a bridge between Senate Democrats and the Trump administration. On Twitter, incoming White House counselor and former Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway praised Manchin’s statement on the miners as a bipartisan example of “putting peoples’ [sic] interests above politics.”
Manchin is one of 10 Democrats up for reelection in states carried by Trump in the presidential race — in Manchin’s case, by more than 40 percentage points.
Manchin met last week with Vice President-elect Mike Pence on the same day that he skipped a closed-door meeting with President Obama on the Affordable Care Act.
He also met with Trump amid speculation that he was under consideration for a Cabinet post and blasted heated rhetoric against the president-elect from retired Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).
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