Politics Story Archives - Page 2 of 18 - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Gubernatorial Candidates Jump Into Race Early

The West Virginia Primary Election is May 14 of next year, but candidates are already declaring their intention to run for the governor’s office.

As News Director Eric Douglas learned when he spoke with Marshall Political Science Professor Marybeth Beller, it all comes down to money.

The West Virginia Primary Election is May 14 of next year, but candidates are already declaring their intention to run for the governor’s office.

As News Director Eric Douglas learned when he spoke with Marshall Political Science Professor Marybeth Beller, it all comes down to money.

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

Douglas: By our count, we now have seven candidates who’ve declared for the governor’s office: Chris Miller, Moore Capito, Mac Warner, J.B. McCuskey, Rashida Yost, Marshall Wilson, and most recently, Patrick Morrisey. Why are they declaring so early?

Beller: There are two big reasons. The first main reason is to intimidate the opposition. And that actually has two related parts to it. Donors want to influence the process, and it’s very important to donors that they get a candidate who’s going to favor their policy outcomes. The first or second candidates are heavily evaluated by donors and not knowing that others might sign on, donors often need to make quick decisions to say which of these candidates is going to best put forward their policy preferences.

You might recall there is interest group called Emily’s List. Emily’s List stands for “Early Money Is Like Yeast.” If you bake, you know how important a bit of yeast is. Early donations that come on board signal to other donors that they might also want to start chipping in. That has the reverberating effect for my second point of intimidating the opposition.

Voters look for these cues, and when they see a candidate that has a large war chest, or a war chest that is building, that gives voters confidence to say, “Oh look. Others see this candidate as having real merit, this might be somebody I should follow.” And so voters sign on also. Getting in there early makes a difference.

Douglas: If somebody gets in early, gets a donor to donate the maximum amount, or however much they donate, it’s less likely that donor will also donate to a direct competitor’s campaign.

Beller: Once a donor commits, then the donor stays just with that sole candidate. Now, especially with medium and large size businesses, those people are more likely to spread their donations out over many candidates and sometimes multiple parties in order to secure influence. But especially with single donors, once people commit, they tend to stick with the person to whom they’ve committed.

Douglas: How does this shake out? I’m not asking you to guess who’s going to win, but it’s got to put a lot of stress on the party.

Beller: My second point, answering your question as to why candidates jump on board early on in the process, is that, particularly if they are an incumbent, they owe it to their party to give the party time to recruit viable candidates to replace them in those seats.

When you see these people who are incumbents, who are well known, signaling early on that they want to move to a different office, it’s a gesture to their party, that allows their party to start recruiting candidates. They have an interest not only in seeking the offices they want, but also in preserving the power of their party, and to leave your party high and dry late in the season means you run the risk of allowing the other party to take the seat you’re vacating.

Douglas: Officially, candidates actually don’t really declare their candidacy until January of 2024.

Beller: That’s right, when the Secretary of State makes that open and available.

Douglas: These are pre-candidacy, but it does allow them to start raising funds.

Beller: Yes, it allows them to start raising funds to build that bandwagon of support. It also allows other candidates to say, “Hey, look, we’re gonna have an open seat in this office.”

Douglas: It’s gonna be an interesting election, isn’t it?

Beller: Fascinating. So many of the incumbents have really had time in office to build expertise to know how to form coalitions and could use that experience to be very effective in higher office.

A third thing to keep in mind is that many times candidates will run for an office, knowing that they don’t have a very viable chance of being elected. But they’re using that opportunity to gain greater name recognition, to build more contacts, so that in an election down the road, they become more viable. And I think what we’re gonna see this term is that a lot of candidates, knowing that it’s not likely they’re going to secure the position they’re running for, are actually going to use that to build momentum for the future.

Douglas: Any other thoughts about the legislature or any big surprises you see coming up in West Virginia?

Beller: Not necessarily for 2024, but the Democratic Party in this state has recently reorganized. It has new leadership, and a lot of Democrats are feeling hopeful. The party has a lot to do to rebuild, and might be able to take some legislative seats in 2024, but I think moving past that, the Democratic Party could become viable again in the state.

The legislative policies that were passed this year are going to have financial repercussions. If they’re successful, it’s going to be very, very good for the Republican Party. But in two to four years, we’re going to be able to see what the result of those fiscal policies are. And if they’re not successful for the state, the Democratic Party could really take back some seats and gain power.

Douglas: If the tax cuts don’t work out then it’s fodder for the Democrats.

Beller: Schools, social services, roads, all of those must be maintained. And this past session, there are some problems we haven’t yet solved. The Public Employees Insurance Agency (PEIA) is going to become more solvent, but that’s going to be done on the backs of the employees. And it’s very tough, because the across the board raises are not going to meet the increasing charges for their health care. But also, the employment problem in our prisons has not been solved. I think that is an ongoing problem. It requires money. And what we’ve done is to just put forward some very heavy tax cuts. It might work to bring in more revenue, but it may not.

Young Leaders From 2022 Mountaineer Boys State Speak Out On Issues

In its 83rd year, the American Legion’s Mountaineer Boys State has more than 200 West Virginia rising high school seniors who are learning political decision making this week.

Boys State replicates the judicial, legislative and executive branches of state government. The young elected leaders traveled to the State Capitol in Charleston Thursday, to meet with their real counterparts.

Will Behrens thought he’d run for a Supreme Court seat, then decided to go big or go home. Elected governor, Behrens – from Notre Dame High School in Clarksburg – said back home he and his friends don’t really talk about issues. He said at Boys State, people were voicing new concerns and perspectives.

“Talking about things like infrastructure, and the expensive cost of medicines like insulin,” Behrens said. “Along with the stigmatization around getting rehab for drug problems. It’s things like that I may never have even thought of.”

Elected Secretary of State, Berkeley County and Spring Mills High rising senior Samuel Stotler was put into the Nationalist Party. He said one of its pillars was renewable energy. Stotler led the stand for nuclear energy, deciding that by far, it’s the cleanest source.

“I actually just came from the Naval Academy summer seminar session last week,” Stotler said. “We actually spoke to their nuclear professor and he explained to us how this was, hands down, the easiest and most efficient and renewable source that we could possibly have.”

Behrens said being 17 years old is tough when it comes to taking action on political issues.

“We’re in an awkward spot, because we can’t vote and we can’t run for elected positions,” Behrens said. “So that’s why Boys State is a really important opportunity. Because all of these thoughts and opinions that we’ve been keeping for all this time, we can finally kind of put those into action.”

Stotler said discussing different viewpoints at a young age is teaching him what all governments need right now: compromise.

“We’re so polarized and nobody’s willing to give in, to stretch their point of view,” Stotler said. “Compromise is direly important to move forward and progress in society.”

The 2022 Mountaineer Boys State continues through the week at Jackson’s Mill in Lewis County.

In Knott County, Kentucky, Gingerbread Is Remembered For Its Connection to Local Politics

When you hear the word “gingerbread,” you might think Christmas. But in southeast Kentucky, when people of a certain age hear “gingerbread,” they think Election Day.

In a special report as part of the Inside Appalachia Folkways Project, Nicole Musgrave, traces the surprising history of gingerbread in Knott County, Kentucky from everyday treat, to election time tradition, to fundraising champion.

Gingerbread Was A Household Staple

In her cozy kitchen in Hindman, Kentucky, LaRue Laferty watches over her teenage grandson, Jaxon Conley, as he makes a fresh batch of gingerbread. All of the ingredients are sitting on the green countertop of the kitchen island. So are the necessary tools, like metal baking sheets, measuring spoons, and a KitchenAid stand mixer.

Laferty, who is in her 80s, has a head full of short, white hair. She wears glasses and a green cotton face mask, and uses a walker to move around her kitchen. If you ask folks around Knott County who the best gingerbread bakers are, Laferty’s name usually comes up.

“I don’t really profess to be a gingerbread-making queen, but I do make a lot,” she says.

When she was growing up, gingerbread was a year-round household staple.

“Anytime we went to grandmother’s, she had it,” Laferty says. “And my mother made it all the time, she kept it made.”

Knott County gingerbread isn’t crisp, snappy cookies, and it’s not moist, fluffy cake. It’s somewhere in between. Bob Young is a local historian born and raised in Knott County. He is in his 70s and he remembers most of the women in his family made this style of gingerbread.

“Gingerbread as we knew it here was just a glorified biscuit,” Young says. “And full, absolutely full of molasses.”

Before white sugar became easily accessible in southeast Kentucky, molasses was the primary sweetener. Every fall, sugarcane farmers hosted stir-offs. Folks gathered to watch as the sugarcane juice was boiled down to a sticky syrup, and they left with full jars to stock their pantries.

Aside from powdered ginger, the other ingredients—flour, fresh eggs, buttermilk and lard—were things people already had on hand. That made gingerbread inexpensive.

“Gingerbread was something that anybody, anybody nearly could get,” Young says.

Just A Nice Little Way To Ask For A Vote

One place you were sure to find gingerbread in Knott County was at the polls on Election Day.

“The candidates, they would hire good gingerbread makers in the community to make gingerbread, and they would give it out at the polls,” Laferty says.

In the 40s and 50s, when Young and Laferty were growing up, it was a common practice.

“Republicans on this side, and the Democrats on that side,” Young says. “And they were all giving you gingerbread. So by the time you voted, you’d have a handful of gingerbread…It was just a nice little way to ask for a vote.”

Laferty says, “they didn’t call it ‘buying votes’ but it’s about what it amounted to.”

Corbett Mullins, another Knott County native, remembers his grandmother as a sought-after gingerbread-maker.

“She would go with her baskets of gingerbread to the polling grounds and hand out the gingerbread in that candidate’s name,” he says.

But during the 1960s, people began handing out something else.

“I hate to say it, but gingerbread was replaced by liquor,” Mullins says.

Then in 1974, Kentucky passed a law against campaigning within 100 feet of a polling place. This was the final blow for political gingerbread.

But surviving recipes may hold clues that link gingerbread and elections. Bob Young has noticed that a lot of recipes make huge batches, and he believes that’s because bakers were making gingerbread for the masses on Election Day.

“Why, some of those old recipes take a five-pound bag of flour,” he says.

How Much Ginger’s It Got In It?

These days, the annual Knott County Gingerbread Festival celebrates gingerbread’s ties to politics and features a gingerbread competition. There are lots of variations of this regional dessert, and everyone has their own preferences.

Mullins, who chaired the festival for decades, says texture is key.

“I have had gingerbread that’s been as dry as the Sahara Desert,” he says. “As soon as you get it chewed up you have to have a drink of water to refresh your mouth.”

Young is focused on ginger.

“Sometimes it would almost burn your tongue,” Young says. “Some people liked it really hot. And that was one of the things they’ll say, ‘How hot is this? How much ginger’s it got in it?’”

Over the years, LaRue Laferty has placed in the gingerbread competition a lot. One year, she entered three batches using different recipes.

“I come in first place and tied myself on second,” she says. “So I didn’t enter any more for a long, long time after that, because I thought, well, that’s good enough.”

The Knott County Gingerbread Festival was cancelled this year because of the pandemic, which was disappointing for Laferty.

“I threatened to go up there and set down on the street and put up a sign and have my own little festival,” she says.

During festival season, Knott County bakers typically sell gingerbread to fundraise for local causes and to earn extra cash. Even though this year’s festival was cancelled, Laferty’s daughter-in-law made close to 4,000 pieces of gingerbread, selling enough to raise nearly $2,000 for her church to pay its winter bills.

LaRue Laferty (left) with her grandson, Jaxon Conley. Conley has been making gingerbread with his grandmother since he was around two-years-old.

A Good Clean Way To Make a Little Extra Money

Back in the kitchen, the room is fragrant with the mingling of ginger, cinnamon, and clove. The oven timer goes off and Laferty takes out the pan. Once the gingerbread cools, her grandson, Jaxon Conley, takes a bite and assesses his work.

“I think it turned out pretty good,” he says. “It’s not too dry, but it’s still moist. And it’s still got the crispy edges on it, which I really like on gingerbread.”

Conley sold the batch he made to a relative. In the past, he has sold gingerbread at the local farmers market, to friends and neighbors, and to classmates at school. One year, he made enough to buy himself a bike.

The finished gingerbread. LaRue Laferty and Jaxon Conley wrapped each piece in a plastic sandwich bag in order to ship it to a relative who purchased the batch from Conley.

Laferty is glad her grandchildren are continuing the Knott County gingerbread tradition, and it gives her comfort to know they have a skill they can rely on if they need to.

“Later on when they get a little older, and maybe they need some extra cash…maybe they can make some gingerbread,” she says. “It’d be a good clean way to make a little extra money.”

This story is part of the Inside Appalachia Folkways Reporting Project, a partnership with West Virginia Public Broadcasting’s Inside Appalachia and the Folklife Program of the West Virginia Humanities Council. The Folkways Reporting Project is made possible in part with support from Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies to the West Virginia Public Broadcasting Foundation. Subscribe to the podcast to hear more stories of Appalachian folklife, arts, and culture.

W.Va. Governor's Race Reveals Identity Crisis Among Both Parties

According to the Secretary of State’s website, 18 people filed financial disclosures last year declaring their intention to run for governor against incumbent Republican Jim Justice. The official period to file just began in the state, and candidates have until Jan. 25 to get their paperwork submitted to the Secretary of State’s website. West Virginia’s primary election is May 12.

Independent producer Kyle Vass looks at some of the candidates running against incumbent Republican Jim Justice, who was elected a Democrat but switched to the Republican party only seven months into his term.

Part One: GOP

Normally, gubernatorial incumbents don’t have to worry about being challenged from within their own party. But with six republican candidates challenging Gov. Jim Justice in 2020, this race is anything but normal.

To understand why the incumbent governor, a Republican, has such a large field of candidates from his own party running against him, we have to go back to 2017, when Justice switched parties.

“It was unexpected. He had been such a down-the-line Democrat with Joe Manchin,” ousted Wood County GOP Chairman Rob Cornelius said. “No one knew what to make of it.”

Cornelius said he refused to start supporting the governor just because he switched to his party. In fact, Cornelius went as far as to go to newly elected State GOP Chairwoman Melody Potter. He wanted the state’s GOP leadership to distance themselves from Justice.

“Melody had pledged to me…that she would be an independent person. She would not sell out to the now-Republican governor,” said Cornelius, who recalled a conversation he had with Potter about Justice’s switch to the GOP. “She believed he was corrupt and would be a bad person to have in the party — that he was dangerous to our reputation, our morals and our standards, and she would have nothing to do with him.”

West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice gives a speech during a Department of Tourism conference Wednesday, Sept. 19, 2018, at the Morgantown Event Center.

Cornelius said he recorded his conversation with Potter, because he believed Potter would later change her story. And almost a year after this conversation, when Melody Potter accepted a large donation to the state GOP from Justice and his wife, Rob Cornelius uploaded the conversation to YouTube. Shortly after that, Potter issued a letter firing Rob Cornelius, in the interest of “effective organization and party harmony,” citing the state GOP bylaws.

Cornelius said his firing created a precedent in the West Virginia GOP: speak out against Justice or GOP leadership, and even an elected official could get fired. As a county chairman, Cornelius was elected, and just like that, he was gone.

He filed suit against Potter and the Secretary of State Mac Warner over his dismissal, and that case is ongoing. We reached out to Melody Potter, as well as Justice’s campaign, for multiple interview requests, but they had no comment.

Cornelius isn’t the only Republican official claiming to have been fired by Justice’s administration or GOP leadership for threatening the governor’s power. One of them is now running his own campaign against the governor — Woody Thrasher.

Thrasher was Justice’s commerce secretary but was fired in 2016. Now he’s running the second-largest campaign in the Republican primary in terms of money raised.

According to Justice’s administration, Thrasher mishandled federal money earmarked for victims of the 2016 West Virginia flood. But Thrasher said the allegations aren’t true.

In terms of fundraising, Mike Folk is running the third-largest campaign in the Republican Primary. He’s behind Thrasher and Justice, who are number one and two, respectively.

Folk explained his platform is largely focused on taxes.

“Instead of going to the taxpayers for more money when the budget’s tight, I think we ought to do like every household in West Virginia has to do, which is tighten their belt,” said Folk, who argues that Justice is not being fiscally conservative enough.

“In 2017, when the current governor was new to office, he campaigned on being a businessman that could balance the budget without raising taxes. He instead proposed the largest tax increase in West Virginia history,” Folk said.

West Virginia Wesleyan College political science professor Rob Rupp said the way he interprets the crowded gubernatorial race, is that many people from both parties frankly have a hard time trusting Justice.

“Perhaps Justice himself is indicative of what’s happened to the breakdown a party labels,” Rupp said.

Having a Republican governor in West Virginia is unusual. But what’s really unusual, Rupp said, is that same governor having to defend his position from candidates who are claiming to be even more Republican than he is.

“He’s alienated the Democrats by leaving his party allegiance. And he’s distrusted by Republicans because of his recent conversion.”

Part Two: Democrats

Democrats in West Virginia find themselves trying to displace a Republican governor for the first time in two decades. And with U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin deciding not to come back and run for governor, a lot of questions remain as to might be able to take back the governor’s mansion.

Six Democratic candidates filed pre-candicay papers in 2018: Jody Murphy, Ben Salango, Cecil Silva, Edwin Vanover, Stephen Smith and Ron Stollings, who said he brings a lot of experience to the ticket with his three terms in the West Virginia Senate.

Another candidate, Kanawha County Commissioner Ben Salango, said he’s running because he wants to bring his economic development experience to the governor’s mansion.

“One of the main things that I’ve done, as Kanawha County Commissioner, is the Shawnee Sports Complex. It has brought in tens of millions of dollars in the sports tourism industry,” he said.

Both Stollings and Salango are very quick to distance themselves from Democrats at the national level.

“I have a proven track record of being a centrist, more socially and economically moderate than our Washington, D.C., friends,” Stollings said. “I’m not far left, am a moderate Democrat. People call it a West Virginia Democrat.”

The term West Virginia Democrat refers to Democrats who tend to vote more moderately than most Democrats across the country, Rupp explained.

“In West Virginia when you’re a Democrat in an increasingly conservative state, you do what I call the West Virginia Democrat two-step, which is you’re taking a step away from the National Party.”

Rupp said West Virginian Democrats have become increasingly conservative during the past 15 to 20 years.

And then you have community organizer Stephen Smith, who is a West Virginian and a Democrat. But, don’t call him a West Virginia Democrat.

“What you see in West Virginia politics is either people sell their souls to big corporate interests and lobbyists and PACs, or they’re already a rich guy who’s made a bunch of money off the backs of other folks and they put their own money in the race,” said Smith, whose campaign raised a record breaking amount in small donations for a West Virginia gubernatorial candidate.

And, he sees his race for governor as just one race in the “West Virginia Can’t Wait” campaign he helped start. They’re currently backing 58 candidates in various elections around the state.

“What we need are candidates at every level of office and a politics that responds to everyday working people, not to the wealthy few. And we can have that government, but only if all of us come together and only if we stop waiting on some politician, any politician, to come and save us,” Smith said.

“Smith is really mobilizing Democrats getting a lot of small contributions,” Rupp said. “Usually in West Virginia politics, it wouldn’t work — that populist candidate makes a challenge, but usually doesn’t win. But of course, these are not usual times and Smith is not running a usual campaign.”

Rupp said he sees an identity crisis in both parties in West Virginia’s 2020 gubernatorial race.

“For the Democrats, it’s more strategic long range, where are they going to bank their future on the populist emphasis of a Smith, or a more moderate and traditional one? And the argument for the Democrats is not just about this election, it’s about the next three elections. And the Republicans are just saying how they want to stay in power.”

This story is part of an episode of Inside Appalachia that looks at politics across Central Appalachia.

UMWA Labor Day Rally, River Boat Workers Discuss Future, & Hope for an Endangered Species

This Labor Day, members of the United Mine Workers of America marched eleven miles from the town of Marmet in West Virginia to Racine. As Emily Allen reports, the route traces part of a much longer journey miners made almost a century ago.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service took a rare species of plant off the endangered species list August 28. Amid controversial proposals to change the law protecting rare species, the Running Buffalo Clover is an example of a successful recovery. Glynis Board went to the woods with some experts to find it and has this story.

Also in this West Virginia Morning, a river barge company called Amherst Madison has been towing coal barges for most of its long history. But a downturn in coal production meant the company had to look to other ways to stay afloat.

Roxy Todd went to talk with some of the people who work at Amherst Madison about how they see the future of the river boat industry. And while she expected to talk economics with them, the conversation took an unexpected turn.

Trump Celebrates at W.Va. Fundraiser after Mueller Hearings

A triumphant President Donald Trump celebrated Wednesday evening after Robert Mueller’s testimony, telling attendees at a closed-door fundraiser in West Virginia that the former special counsel’s appearance was a dud.

Trump, who arrived at the fundraiser energized and excited, told a crowd at the WesBanco Arena that Mueller’s testimony was nothing more than a miserable effort by Democrats to discredit him, West Virginia Senate President Mitch Carmichael told The Associated Press.

Trump called Mueller’s remarks a dud for anyone who thought new, more damaging information would emerge, said Carmichael, a Republican who was in attendance.

Trump had some prepared remarks but largely veered into familiar themes for the rapt audience: the need for a southern border wall, the United States getting ripped off on international trade deals and his enduring support in deep-red West Virginia.

Carmichael said Trump met briefly with a small group that included the governors of West Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio before taking the stage.

Attendees’ cell phones were locked away in bags.

The event was hosted by Robert E. Murray, the president and CEO of Murray Energy. Murray is a supporter of Trump’s regulatory actions aimed at scaling back environmental protections put in place during Barack Obama’s presidency. His company is the largest underground coal mining company in America.

A Republican National Committee official said about 1,000 people had been slated to attend the event, which was expected to raise $2.5 million for a joint committee supporting Trump’s reelection campaign and the RNC.

Trump left for West Virginia shortly after Mueller finished testifying before Congress and was greeted in the state by Republican Gov. Jim Justice and a crowd of supporters chanting “USA!”

He told reporters before he left that the state was doing great on his watch.

Izaguirre reported from Charleston, West Virginia.