The answer is yes:
When Roy Moore became a top contender for the Alabama Senate seat vacated by Jeff Sessions, it was without the help of the Republican party. “Our goal is to nominate people in the primaries next year who can actually win,” Mitch McConnell famously said in a thinly veiled dig at Steve Bannon, who heavily backed Moore in the primary at the expense of McConnell’s chosen candidate. The Senate majority leader’s instincts proved correct: Moore was eventually beaten out by Democrat Doug Jones. But even without a vindictive nationalist backer, outsider candidates emboldened by the Trump era continue to be a thorn in the G.O.P.’s side, further slanting the party’s uphill battle to stay afloat in 2018.
The foremost example lies in the Republican party’s ongoing battle with Don Blankenship, a Republican primary candidate in West Virginia. Blankenship also happens to be the former C.E.O. of a controversial coal-mining company, and recently served a year-long stint in federal prison for his role in the deaths of 29 miners in a 2010 explosion at one of his mines. Just as McConnell’s allies at the Senate Leadership Fund spent millions on ads in an attempt to stamp out Moore, last week the newly formed Mountain Families PAC, which has connections to several G.O.P.-linked firms, began a West Virginia ad run that squarely targets Blankenship. According to Politico, the nearly $700,000 buy focuses on how Blankenship’s company dumped “toxic coal slurry” into drinking water, asking viewers, “Isn’t there enough toxic sludge in Washington?”
The national Republican Party has not taken credit for the ads and, in fact, fiercely debated attacking Blankenship at all, fearing the onslaught would allow him to position himself as a populist anti-Establishmentarian. As expected, Blankenship hit back on Monday, blaming McConnell for attempting to manipulate the race from afar. “McConnell should not be in the U.S. Senate, let alone be the Republican Majority Leader. He is a Swamp captain,” Blankenship said in a statement. “The Russians and McConnell should both stop interfering with elections outside their jurisdictions.” He added that “the media, McConnell, and others also like to spread the rumor that my candidacy is akin to that of Roy Moore. This is nonsense. Roy Moore’s accusers were women and teenage girls . . . my accusers are Barack Obamaand Hillary Clinton. I was imprisoned for a misdemeanor based on false charges and a political prosecution.”
It’s not just McConnell who’s worried about Blankenship’s candidacy:
As the race gets closer, alarms are going off in Senate leadership suites. At a Monday evening Senate Republican leadership meeting, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) focused on Blankenship’s weakness, explaining to other Republicans that the former coal magnate would be difficult for the party to defend in the state, according to attendees.
He specifically referenced accusations that Blankenship’s companies contaminated drinking water. A case involving the issue was settled with West Virginia residents, though Massey Energy, which Blankenship led, admitted no wrongdoing.
“That’s not popular in West Virginia,” Gardner told leaders gathered in McConnell’s office, referring to the contamination claims.
But Blankenship is using his jail time as a talking point to boost his campaign:
The former CEO of Massey Energy served a one-year sentence, ending in May 2017, for conspiring to violate mine health and safety standards in connection with the nation’s deadliest coal mining explosion in decades. Blankenship’s period of supervised release doesn’t end until May 9, the day after the primary, according to court records.
But Blankenship said he was “falsely imprisoned” by the Obama administration, and he doesn’t see that as a political liability — not to West Virginians who blame the former president for waging a war on coal and their livelihoods. To him, such an “improper” conviction can be a political asset.
It was, he noted, for former South African president Nelson Mandela, who spent 27 years in prison for fighting an apartheid government. “There are situations in history where being in prison was an advantage,” he said during a recent interview with USA TODAY. “I think that’s the case in West Virginia.”
There may have been a time in the U.S. when a candidate’s conviction — the criminal kind — represented a political deal-breaker. But this is an era in which President Trump famously claimed he could shoot someone and not lose any voters.
Blankenship is not the only 2018 candidate who is still considered viable despite legal baggage. Michael Grimm, a GOP candidate for his former New York House seat, pleaded guilty in 2014 to tax fraud, and former Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, an Arizona Senate candidate, was pardoned by President Trump last year for a contempt of court conviction in a racial profiling case.
“Maybe I’m wrong, but I still think a conviction for murder would prevent someone’s election,” said Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics.
Polls commissioned by Blankenship’s primary opponents —- Rep. Evan Jenkins and the state’s Attorney General Patrick Morrisey — show Blankenship, 68, is within striking distance of the lead. He is a self-funded candidate who can laugh when he says, “I don’t need any money” and blankets the airwaves with his message.
Here’s a little more information about Blankenship’s criminal record:
Blankenship is currently on probation after serving one year in federal prison for conspiring to violate mine safety standards. In a press release published Monday announcing the pending motion to overturn the guilty verdict, Blankenship’s campaign website states: “Lies about Don do not serve any good for West Virginia or its miners.”
Blankenship, who is seeking the Republican nomination to run against Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), said in the statement that there is no way to predict the timing of any decision in response to his request to have the verdict “invalidated.” But the former Massey Energy CEO said his attorneys tell him that they expect the case will likely be “nullified or dismissed.”
A successful bid to get the guilty verdict nullified or dismissed could help Blankenship’s chances in a general election against Manchin if he wins the Republican primary.
The court motion also appears to be an effort to change the narrative away from a GOP-funded advertising campaign against Blankenship’s bid for the Republican nomination. Many Republicans believe a Blankenship victory in the May 8 primary could further embarrass the political party that has seen extremists win primaries across the nation.
As the statement released Monday indicates, Blankenship’s campaign will air TV ads “in the near future” about his efforts to overturn the conviction.
And Blankenship is getting more help to make his case:
Booth Goodwin, U.S. Attorney during the federal trial of former coal executive Don Blankenship, is one of the officers of a political action committee taking aim at Blankenship’s Republican primary opponents for U.S. Senate.
The ultimate goal of the political action committee is to help out the presumed Democratic nominee, incumbent U.S. Senator Joe Manchin.
But the degrees of separation between Goodwin and Blankenship make for a strange bedfellows twist.
Contacted this morning and asked to confirm whether he’s the Booth Goodwin listed as treasurer for the Duty and Country PAC, Goodwin responded, “Do you know another Booth Goodwin?!”
He then directed questions to Mike Plante, spokesman for the political action committee.
Plante said the organization is directing its fire at state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey and Congressman Evan Jenkins because they appear to be the front-runners in the Republican primary.
“Our focus right now is on Morrisey and Evan Jenkins. Our data indicates that one of the two of them would most likely be the nominee, so that’s why we’re focused on what we’re focused on,” Plante said.
“Don Blankenship’s participation in the race is at this point not a focus for us.”
Plante said the PAC could point its advertising against Blankenship if polling would show that he becomes a front runner.
The West Virginia primary is May 8.
U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (D. WV) has clearly been paying attention to this primary and is already preparing to take on Blankenship:
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) highlighted a 1968 mine explosion in his first reelection ad on Wednesday — an apparent jab at a potential Republican opponent who oversaw a company responsible for another fatal mine disaster.
Manchin’s video is seen as a reference to Don Blankenship, the former CEO of Massey Energy and a contender for the Republican nomination.
Blankenship was convicted in 2015 of conspiring to violate safety standards at the Upper Big Branch mine, where a mine disaster in 2010 left 29 people dead. Blankenship was released from his 1-year prison sentence in 2017.
In his campaign ad, Manchin stands in front of what appears to be a memorial for those that died in an earlier mine explosion in 1968 and points out the names of people he knew who died.
“I lost an uncle, I lost a neighbor, I lost guys I played ball with,” Manchin says. “This is real for me.”
“People here have been screwed by both political parties,” Manchin goes on to say. “Yes, Washington sucks, but West Virginians don't give up, and I will never give up trying to make it better.”
I can put aside my feelings for Manchin to make sure criminals like Blankenship don't become Senators. Click here if you want to donate and get involved with Manchin's re-election campaign.