It is not every day that a politician keeps his word and honors his constituents’ wishes all in the face of massive pressure from his own political party to do the opposite. But West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin did exactly that this Sunday when he defied President Joe Biden and told the nation he could not support the Build Back Better Act.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki may claim that Manchin “reversed his position” and breached “commitments to the president and the senator’s colleagues in the House and Senate.” But Manchin has been crystal clear about his objections to Biden’s agenda from the beginning.

On Oct. 21 , Manchin said, “The thing that I’m very much committed to is if we’re going to tell the people we’re paying for something and the revenue is a 10-year revenue, then the program should be for 10 years.”

But on Oct. 28, Biden released a new Build Back Better bill that did the exact opposite. Instead of picking one program and paying for 10 years of spending with 10 years of revenue as Manchin clearly said he wanted, Biden chose to fund a bunch of programs for just a few years and pay for them with 10 years of revenue.

Manchin was not shy about detailing his objections with this framework. Consistent with his Oct. 21 statement, Manchin said Nov. 1 that Biden’s new Build Back Better bill was full of “shell games” and “budget gimmicks.” Noting that the real 10-year cost of all the programs in Biden’s bill was more than double what Biden claimed, Manchin correctly said, “This is a recipe for economic crisis.”

Did the White House listen to Manchin’s very consistent objections to the Build Back Better Act?

Not at all. Instead, they tried to bully him into submission. But Manchin is strong. And Biden’s bullying failed.

It does help that the people of West Virginia are on Manchin’s side. Not only did Biden lose West Virginia by 40 points in 2020 but the most recent polling from the Mountain State shows that 74% of West Virginians oppose Biden’s Build Back Better plan.

If anybody’s credibility is in question here, it is Biden’s. This is a president who said the surge of migrants at the southern border would be seasonal and then was proved wrong. He said the Taliban would never take over Afghanistan, and then they did. He said inflation would be transitory, and then it wasn’t. He said he would control COVID, and he hasn’t.

No wonder, according to the latest CNN poll , 66% of voters say Biden is not a leader who can be trusted. Meanwhile, 60% of West Virginia voters approve of the job Manchin is doing as their senator.

The White House says they “will continue to press” Manchin “to see if he will reverse his position yet again.” But Manchin hasn’t reversed anything. He’s been rock-solid consistent the entire time.

If only more of our elected leaders were so dependable.