Lifelong Democrat who became independent gives series of warnings to former party and predicts US ‘is not going left’US senator Joe Manchin, a lifelong Democrat who left the party earlier this year to become an independent and is now stepping down from the Senate after 15 years, issued a series of warnings on Sunday to members of his former party.“The D-brand has been so maligned from the standpoint of – it’s just, it’s toxic,” Manchin told CNN, saying he had not been able to consider himself a Democrat “in the form of what Democratic party has turned itself into”. Continue reading...