Handcrafted elephant, donkey presented during Senate gift exchange
by Jared Hunt
Daily Mail Capitol Reporter
Charleston Daily Mail
CHARLESTON, W.Va.-- While traditionally seen as a bad thing, Sen. Joe Manchin was happy to both give and receive lumps of coal in a holiday gift exchange with his fellow U.S. senators Monday evening.
His gift of West Virginia coal to fellow Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., ended up being the most talked-about gift of the party.
This was the first year ever that members of the U.S. Senate actually decided to partake in a 'Secret Santa' gift exchange at the U.S. Capitol.
The polite affair was an idea pushed by Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn. Franken, who is Jewish, thought an informal, bipartisan, interfaith gift exchange ahead of the holidays might be a good way to combat partisan rancor that has become so characteristic of Washington.
"I thought 'Secret Santa' would be a good way to cut through the partisan divide here in the Senate," Franken said in a statement to CNN. "And who knows, maybe it will create some unlikely friendships."
Sixty-one senators participated.
Franken said it was a 'Secret Santa' exchange in grade school that helped him become friends with someone who had been bullying him.
While no one's been beating anyone up for lunch money in the Senate this year, Manchin said the exchange was a good chance for senators — who have seemed more naughty than nice to one another — to interact.
"It was a great break," Manchin said in a phone interview Tuesday. "I think it went well, and I was able to give a piece of West Virginia in the best fashion."
When two of his staff members went home to visit family in the KanawhaValley last weekend, Manchin had them swing by the state Culture Centergift shop to pick up his gift — which, by rule, had to be less than $10.
The gift: a donkey and an elephant handcrafted from West Virginia-mined coal.
He wrapped it up for Sen. Schumer and included a small note to help him guess who it was from, as well as make a statement about the current state of politics in the country.
"With an eight percent approval rating, both Democrats and Republicans in Congress deserve to have coal in their stocking this year," Manchin wrote. "Lucky for us, my state has more than enough to go around."