Democrats’ support in coal areas may never come back. Dems may face long coal country exile

The Republicans’ romp this week may have permanently turned coal country from blue to red.

Coal-heavy districts in West Virginia, Kentucky and Illinois that had been steadily moving away from Democrats in recent elections appear to have completed that shift Tuesday, when they overwhelmingly backed Republicans who vowed to oppose what they call President Barack Obama’s “war on coal.”


Democrats’ support in coal areas may never come back, said Andrew Wheeler of the law firm Faegre Baker Daniels, a former GOP staff director for Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

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“This has been a growing trend in coal politics and will outlast President Obama’s tenure,” Wheeler said.

In West Virginia, once a long-time Democratic stronghold, Republicans will take control of both houses of the state legislature for the first time since 1931. Republicans picked up seven seats in the state Senate to bring the balance to 17-17, and then Democrat Daniel Hall switched parties Wednesday to give the majority to the GOP.

Voters there also elected Rep. Shelley Moore Capito as their first GOP senator in 56 years, and Republicans won three congressional contests, even kicking out 38-year incumbent Rep. Nick Rahall.

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Coal was only one issue for voters, who also cited the economy and Obamacare as reasons for ditching the Democrats in the midterms. But with EPA moving ahead on rules to limit greenhouse gases from power plants, and its past pollution regulations helping push dozens of old coal-fired power plants into retirement, candidates who line up with the president became a tough sell in areas that have few other industries outside the shrinking coal-mining sector.

The “policies and priorities espoused by the national Democratic Party, as reflected in their platform, don’t resonate with the priorities, beliefs and feelings of the people” of West Virginia, said Evan Jenkins, the Republican who will take Rahall’s place in Congress.

“Southern West Virginia in particular has been devastated economically over this last six years in the war on coal,” he said. “It’s very difficult for West Virginia Democrats to explain to the voters why their party maintains such an anti-coal agenda.”

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But one West Virginia Democrat said the party may have a good chance of shedding that anti-coal image once Obama leaves office.

“Obviously the war on coal has been a powerful narrative for the Republicans,” said Dave Eplin, executive director of the West Virginia Young Democrats. “I think at this point they may have tied it so tightly to Obama that it may be difficult to continue it when he’s out of office.”

Eplin said Rahall’s loss surprised him, as did the defeat of Nick Casey, who lost to Republican Alex Money in the contest to replace Capito in the House.

Across coal states, the United Mine Workers of America union ferociously backed Democratic candidates, including Rahall, Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes in Kentucky and Capito’s opponent, Natalie Tennant. But its endorsements didn’t appear to sway many voters.

In West Virginia exit polls, 80 percent of voters said they felt the country was “seriously off on the wrong track,” 61 percent said they have an unfavorable view of the Democratic Party and 44 percent described their feelings toward the Obama administration as “angry.” Just under half of voters polled said part of their Senate vote was to express opposition to Obama.

“I think in West Virginia you are seeing systemic change,” said Bill Bissett, president of the Kentucky Coal Association. The president is the “prime mover,” but it’s the result of a long-term effort by state Republicans where just a few years ago, a Democrat running for office might not have even faced a Republican challenger.

While West Virginia has been trending toward the Republican Party for years, in Kentucky, where Sen. Mitch McConnell beat Grimes by 15 percentage points, Obama’s policies on coal appeared to have helped the GOP, he said.

McConnell won by the largest margins in the state’s coal-producing counties, often topping the 70 percent mark. “I’m not sure some of those counties he’s won ever,” said Bissett. The senator won 47 counties where more than 60 percent of voters are registered Democrats.

As the next Senate majority leader, McConnell says Republicans “will use the power of the purse to try to push back against this overactive bureaucracy,” pointing to the “war on coal” as a prime example.

While the new GOP majority in Congress means fossil fuels will see more support in Washington, the loss of so many Democrats from coal-heavy House districts may make it harder for Republicans to reach across the aisle on measures to benefit the industry.

With the defeats Rahall, Bill Enyart (D-Ill.) and John Barrow (D-Ga.), “it is going to be much harder crafting bipartisan legislation on energy and environmental issues in the House,” Wheeler said.

Enyart, a co-chairman of the congressional coal caucus, represented a southern Illinois district heavily reliant on coal, and Barrow and Rahall held the center on the House Energy and Commerce Committee as “go-to Democrats for sponsorship of Republican-led and industry-favored legislation and letters,” Wheeler said. “Their defeat means it will be harder to attract Democrats to such efforts.”

Earlier this year, seven Senate Democrats lobbied Obama to rethink a proposed EPA regulation aimed at limiting carbon emissions from future coal-fired power plants. One of them, Arkansas Sen. Mark Pryor, won’t be returning next year. Two others remain question marks: Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu, who faces a difficult runoff election next month, and Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, who may face a recount after winning his seat by less than 1 percent.

Republicans will still have Democrats Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Donnelly of Indiana to turn to on coal issues.

Manchin, West Virginia’s remaining Democrat in a national office, is still hopeful about finding a way forward on climate change regulations. But he hasn’t written off retreating to the state and running for his old job of governor if he can’t find common ground between the two parties in Washington.

“I’m keeping every option open, I’ll wait until next year, see how things shape out,” he told POLITICO. “If it looks like it’s going to be same old, same old … it’s not going to be a place I’m going to want to spend a great deal of time.”

Correction: This story has been updated to correct a misspelling in Capito’s name.

CORRECTION: Corrected by: Daniella Diaz @ 11/08/2014 10:28 AM Correction: This story has been updated to correct a misspelling in Capito’s name.