Winds of Change Newsletter, September 2005     See sidebar for table of contents

The Real Friends of Coal

by Janet Keating

Data supplied by People’s Election Reform Coalition

Have you ever wondered why the coal industry wields so much political power in West Virginia? Let’s take a look at some recent campaign contribution data from the coal industry and its supporters.

PERC has found that from 1996-2004, coal and its supporters have contributed $2,136,969 to our governors for their campaigns and inaugural parties. Governor Manchin’s contributions also include what he received during his successful bid for Secretary of State (Table 1).

Manchin now holds the record for the most money received from the coal industry and its supporters – $745,714 – for his campaigns and inaugural. Manchin also collected more money from all special interests for the inaugural party – $1,374,992, despite the fact that prior to 1998 there was no limit to the amount of money a person could donate to the inaugural party. Total contributions from all special interests to the past three governors’ campaigns and inaugurals are an astounding $17,007,523! Just to keep the dollars in perspective – the governor’s salary is $95,000 per year.

It’s only fair to point out that the governor’s office isn’t the only one that coal and its supporters target for campaign donations. Others in the House of Delegates and state Senate, notably leadership, also receive hefty contributions for their political campaigns.

The salary for state legislators is $15,000 per year. An example of these contributions is in Table 2.

The general breakdown of contributions to the West Virginia legislature from coal and its supporters from 1996 to 2004 to West Virginia appears in Table 3.

Is it a big surprise to anyone that the legislature’s solution to the problem of overweight coal trucks in recent years was to increase the weight limits for coal trucks instead of enforcing the law?

And that’s only one example of how the coal industry receives a return on its “investments” to legislative campaigns.

As Julie Archer, the research analyst for the Mountain State Education and Research Foundation (MSERF), so aptly put it: “Coal keeps the lights on for these elected officials.”

We can’t ignore the contributions of coal and its supporters to newly elected Supreme Court Justice Brent Benjamin. Brent Benjamin received $248,200 from coal and its supporters, or 31 percent of his total contributions.  Not surprisingly, the biggest portion of that money, $44,400, came from Massey Energy executives, members of their board of directors and their spouses. If one includes money from the Addington Brothers, who sold Horizon Resources to Massey Energy, and “Buck” Harless, who until recently served on Massey Energy’s board of directors, that bumps the total to $44,800.

This amount seems paltry compared to the amount of money that Massey Energy’s CEO, Don Blankenship, spent on the WV Supreme Court race. According to the Charleston Daily Mail: “Last fall he spent millions of his own dollars in a successful effort to see that incumbent Supreme Court Justice Warren McGraw was defeated.”

PERC calculates that Blankenship spent approximately $2.5 million on the 527 group, And For the Sake of the Kids, and another $500,000 in an independent campaign.

Someone once said that “Elections that are for sale aren’t free.” We can’t help wondering how impartial Justice Brent Benjamin will be when issues regarding Massey Energy or other coal companies come before the Court.

The People’s Election Reform Coalition, who supplied this data, is a joint project of OVEC, WV CAG and their sister organization, MSERF. PERC has been tracking, analyzing and publicizing contributions from the coal industry to “our” politicians since the 1996 election cycle.

The data comes straight from the campaign finance reports that candidates are required to file with the West Virginia Secretary of State.