CHARLESTON, W. Va. (AP) – The Latest on the Republican U. S. Senate candidacy of former Massey Energy…
CHARLESTON, W. Va. (AP) – The Latest on the Republican U. S. Senate candidacy of former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship: (all times local):
2:45 p.m.
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey is calling on former Massey Energy CEO Donald Blankenship to file a required personal financial disclosure form in the U. S. Senate race.
Morrisey said at a news conference Sunday that Blankenship ’s failure to file the form violates the Ethics in Government Act. Morrisey and Blankenship are among six Republican candidates in Tuesday’s Senate primary in West Virginia.
Blankenship campaign spokesman Greg Thomas says the candidate is “in the process” of filing the paperwork and has sent notification it would be late. Thomas says Blankenship ’s form is complicated.
Morrisey says he plans to forward information to Blankenship ’s probation officer to determine whether it’s a violation of Blankenship ’s supervised release. He served a year in prison for conspiring to violate federal mine safety standards.
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10:15 a.m.
A former coal executive’s bid for the U. S. Senate is shaking up politics in the state of West Virginia.
Former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship is among six candidates in the Republican Senate primary Tuesday, almost a year to the day since his release from a California prison.
Blankenship ’s quest is to take down the man he blames for fueling public distrust of him: Democratic U. S. Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia.
The 68-year-old Blankenship served a one-year prison term on a misdemeanor conviction for conspiring to violate federal mine safety standards at Massey ’s Upper Big Branch Mine. An explosion at the mine in 2010 killed 29 miners.
