Politico reports:

Joe Manchin is hearing a dire pitch from his colleagues: Don’t blow our chance to save the world.

After Manchin rejected a centerpiece of President Joe Biden’s climate plan and rebuffed a separate carbon tax Tuesday, Senate Democrats are urgently pressing their West Virginia colleague for an alternative. Biden and Democrats are trying to clinch a deal on Biden’s larger social spending bill, but the climate plank has become a serious question mark due to Manchin. And some progressives are reiterating they won’t support any bill that doesn’t have a strong climate component.

Manchin is reluctant to embrace anything that could significantly disadvantage West Virginia’s gas and coal industry. Though he is endorsing some lower-tier clean energy investments, those fall far short of the two big ideas his colleagues have championed: a program encouraging utilities to cut emissions and a carbon tax. Now, there’s enormous pressure on Democrats to get Manchin on board with what could be Democrats’ only chance in a decade or more to enact consequential climate policies. [Continue reading…]