Republicans have demanded that Democrats use the budget reconciliation process to raise the debt limit, but Democratic leaders described it as a nonstarter. The process opens the Senate up to unwieldy and time-consuming marathon vote series known vote-a-ramas.

“We just can’t let the debt ceiling lapse. We just can’t,” Manchin said, adding that Democrats should not be concerned about politically sensitive votes.

“We can prevent default, we really can prevent it. And there’s a way to do that, and there’s a couple other tools we have that we can use. Takes a little bit of time, a little bit of — it’s gonna be a little bit of pain, long vote-a-ramas, this and that — do what you have to do. But we cannot — and I want people to know — we will not let this country default.”

Asked if leadership should use the reconciliation process, Manchin said, “We’ll do what we have to do, absolutely.”