Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J., who switched from the Democratic to Republican Party in 2020, told Newsmax that Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., should switch parties as he did, and join the ''party of the future.''
''I hope he does become Republican,'' Van Drew said on Tuesday's ''Spicer & Co.'' ''He has my invitation to join the Republican Party. The Republican Party, I really believe, is going to be the party of the future.''
Manchin, a centrist, has come under fire from other Democrats for announcing his opposition to the nearly $2 trillion Build Back Better Act in the evenly divided Senate, effectively killing the signature legislation for Democrats and President Joe Biden.
''I agree with what he did, and thank God he didn't vote for that bill,'' Van Drew said. ''He may become an independent. He may become a Republican, and I think he's crazy if he stays [with the Democrats]. They're just beating the daylights out of him. He's trying to maintain some sense of normalcy in the party, but this isn't the party we used to know.''
Van Drew, who left the Democrats himself after going to Congress as one in 2018 and voted in 2019 against impeaching then-President Donald Trump over his phone call with newly elected Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
"When the Democrats tried to order me around, I was ready, willing and able to say, I've had enough with their radical socialist agenda," he said in a USA Today article about his switch in August 2020, adding that when he met with Trump, he "made me feel more comfortable and welcome in the Oval Office than [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi ever made me feel in her caucus."
Van Drew said Tuesday that the Democratic Party has gotten too extreme and no longer aligns with the views of most Americans.
''This is a party that is extreme,'' he said. ''This is a party of socialism. This is a party of Marxism. This is a party that literally is destroying our very nation. We've never seen anything like this before.''
Van Drew said that Manchin may get some pushback if he does switch to the Republicans, but he would probably ''be happy.''
''You really have to think it through,'' he said. ''It's not easy, because some people, you know, are going to be very angry. Not on the Republican side, though. It will be on the Democratic side, and they will say terrible things about him.''
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