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Manchester, N.H.USA - July 17 , 2023: West Va. Sen. Joe Manchin speaks at a No Labels event.Shutterstock

(LifeSiteNews) — West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin criticized Vice President Kamala Harris’ pledge to gut the filibuster and said he will not be backing her in the 2024 presidential election.

Manchin is a former Democrat who now identifies as an independent, though he still caucuses with his former party. He criticized Harris for saying she wants to end the Senate filibuster in order to pass a national pro-abortion law. While only 51 votes are needed to pass legislation in the Senate, 60 votes are needed to end debate. Democrats currently have a 51-49 majority in the Senate.

READ: Kamala Harris vows to sign federal pro-abortion law, pro-LGBT ‘Equality Act’ in campaign platform

“I think we should eliminate the filibuster for Roe,” Harris told Wisconsin Public Radio on Tuesday. “And get us to the point where 51 votes would be what we need to actually put back in law the protections for reproductive freedom and for the ability of every person and every woman to make decisions about their own body and not have their government tell them what to do,” she added, euphemistically referring to the destruction of innocent unborn children throughout pregnancy.

Harris has previously supported ending the filibuster.

“Shame on her,” Manchin, who is retiring, told CNN.

“She knows the filibuster is the Holy Grail of democracy. It’s the only thing that keeps us talking and working together. If she gets rid of that, then this would be the House on steroids,” he said, according to CNN.

“That ain’t going to happen,” he said, when asked about supporting Harris. “I think that basically can destroy our country, and my country is more important to me than any one person or any one person’s ideology. … I think it’s the most horrible thing.”

Harris’ pledge drew support from Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey, a pro-abortion Democrat who has occasionally voted for limits on abortion and infanticide.

“I believe for a long time that the 60-vote rule has been an impediment to progress on a whole host of fronts, including voting rights, which we tried to pass in 2022,” Casey told CNN. “And in the process of trying to pass the bill, we tried to change the rule. So we can pass voting rights. I think the same is true for women’s rights, workers’ rights, so common sense gun measures to reduce gun violence.”

Manchin supports Roe v. Wade despite being ‘pro-life’

Manchin has a mixed record on abortion. He said he was “deeply disappointed” in 2022 when the Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade.

Though he has referred to himself as a “pro-life” Catholic, he said he supports Roe v. Wade, which allows babies to be killed in the womb in all 50 states with few, if any, limits.

“As a Catholic, I was raised pro-life and will always consider myself pro-life. But I have come to accept that my definition of pro-life may not be someone else’s definition of pro-life,” Manchin stated in June 2022.

“I believe that exceptions should be made in instances of rape, incest and when the life of the mother is in jeopardy,” Manchin stated. “But let me be clear, I support legislation that would codify the [so-called] rights Roe v. Wade previously protected.”

Pro-lifers, however, note that the circumstances of someone’s conception do not affect his or her right to life. Furthermore, medical experts have confirmed that direct abortion, which is never justifiable under any circumstances, is never necessary to save a mother’s life. Moreover, Roe v. Wade did not only allow for abortion in those limited cases cited by Manchin, but rather for virtually any reason.

He has previously supported a federal ban on abortions at 20 weeks but also supported giving hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money to abortion giant Planned Parenthood.

In 2018, he opposed a West Virginia ballot measure that declared there is no “right to abortion” in the state constitution. “Because it does not have the exceptions of incest, rape, and the life of the mother,” Manchin said during a debate.

However, as noted by LifeSiteNews, the measure did not ban abortion, but rather said the issue should be left up to voters and the legislature, not the state courts.

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