Joe Manchin ‘Stunned’ By AOC’s Charlie Kirk Rant: Dems ‘Are Getting Worse, Not Better’

Former Senator Joe Manchin (I-WV) criticized far-left Democrats on Sunday, specifically calling out Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) for her recent comments opposing a congressional resolution honoring the late Charlie Kirk.

During an appearance on CNN with host Kasie Hunt, Manchin said he was “stunned” by Ocasio-Cortez’s rhetoric following Kirk’s assassination, calling it divisive, unnecessary, and emblematic of why Democrats continue to lose support nationwide.

“She does say that we should ‘be clear about who Charlie Kirk was, a man who believed that the Civil Rights Act that granted black Americans the right to vote was a mistake,’” Hunt noted, referencing Ocasio-Cortez’s floor speech. “She goes on to name some of the other things that he believes in. What was your reaction to her vote and to her statement afterward?”

“First of all, I just saw a little while ago, and I was stunned, Kasie. I really was,” Manchin responded. “This is not the place and the time for that at all. If the Democrats — if AOC and the far Left, the extreme Left I want to say — believe that’s where the party, the Democratic Party, is today, then that’ll tell you why you lost people like me, and an awful lot.”

Manchin, who recently changed his party affiliation to independent, used the moment to highlight growing dissatisfaction among moderate and working-class Democrats.

“Now, let me tell you what you’ve lost,” he continued. “Since the last election, they’ve been doing their national tour and thinking, boy, that’s something, we’re really getting into something. The Democratic Party has lost more than 160,000 Democrats that have basically left the party since the November election. So if that’s the way the Democrat Party is going, it’s getting worse, not better.”

Ocasio-Cortez has come under fire from across the political spectrum for her tone-deaf reaction to Kirk’s death. In a floor speech, she objected to honoring him posthumously, arguing that his views on race and culture made him unworthy of national recognition—even after his assassination.

The backlash to AOC’s stance underscores the widening rift in the Democratic Party between radical progressives and more traditional centrists like Manchin, who warned that the party’s hard-left drift is alienating millions of Americans.