Jamaal Bowman: 'Joe Manchin Has Become The New Mitch McConnell'

"Joe Manchin has become the new Mitch McConnell," Bowman told CNN's John Berman on New Day.

"Mitch McConnell during Obama's presidency said he would do everything in his power to stop Obama," the congressman continued.

"He's also repeated that now during the Biden presidency by saying he would do everything in his power to stop President Biden, and now Joe Manchin is doing everything in his power to stop democracy and to stop our work for the people, the work that the people sent us here to do."

Manchin, a self-described moderate Democrat, has justified his decisions by urging Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Congress to work together.

According to Bowman, what Manchin is doing has nothing to do with bipartisanship.

In fact, the West Virginia Democrat is helping the GOP obstruct Biden's agenda, Bowman argued.

"Manchin is not pushing us closer to bipartisanship. He is doing the work of the Republican Party by being an obstructionist, just like they've been since the beginning of Biden's presidency," he said. 

Manchin defended his decision to vote against Democrats' voting rights bill in a Sunday op-ed penned for the the Charleston Gazette.

In the column, the senator argued that "partisan voting legislation will destroy the already weakening binds of our democracy," saying that "the fundamental right to vote has itself become overtly politicized."

Manchin has also warned Democrats against moving to abolish the filibuster, claiming that doing so would set a dangerous precedent and enable Republicans to ram their bills into law once they are back in power. 

Some D.C. observers are skeptical of Bowman and other Democrats' claims that Manchin is to blame for Biden's failures.

Pulitzer prize-winning reporter Glenn Greenwald argued in a Twitter thread Monday that Democrats would find a different "rotating villain" if Manchin was powerless.

"If Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema weren't blocking all the lovely and wonderful things the Democratic Party pretends it wants to do, they would just have other Senators doing it instead," Greenwald wrote.

"Anyone who doesn't know this understands nothing about how that party functions," he added.