PolitiFact: Only ‘Mostly True’ to Point Out Joe Manchin Has ‘D’ Rating from NRA

Politifact tested Patrick Morrisey’s (R) claim that Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) has a D-rating from the NRA and suggested it is only “mostly true” to point out the low grade.

They reached this conclusion because Manchin had a higher grade over a decade ago. In so doing they missed Morrisey’s point, which is that Manchin has been “abandoned” by the NRA because of his embrace of gun control in recent years.

Morrisey tweeted:

On September 28 Breitbart News reported that Manchin came into office via a 2010 special election in which he campaigned as defender of West Virginia gun rights. However, once in office, he quickly became one of the Democrats’ staunchest gun control proponents and, following the December 14, 2012, attack on Sandy Hook Elementary, he garnered enough favor with Barack Obama that PBS reported he was chosen as gun control point man for Obama’s White House.

On January 7, 2015, Breitbart News reported that Manchin actually believed the NRA would support his post-Sandy Hook gun control push. Instead, they ended any and all contact with with him regarding the gun control bill and went on the offensive against Manchin for trampling his own pro-gun campaign promises. Then they ran a commercial showing candidate Joe Manchin promising to protect Second Amendment rights, followed by an NRA narrator saying, “That was Joe Manchin’s commitment. But now Manchin is working with President Obama and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Concerned? You should be.”

Manchin’s NRA grade plummeted as a result and Morrisey correctly noted that Manchin currently gets a D-rating from the gun rights group.

But Politifact notes that Manchin got an A+ from the NRA in 2004 followed by an A in 2010, when he promised he would be pro-gun if elected to the Senate. Manchin did not keep that promise, yet Politifact suggests Morrisey’s claim that Manchin has a D-rating is only “mostly true” because he had a much higher grade 14 years ago.

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News, the host of the Breitbart podcast Bullets with AWR Hawkins, and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.