After the Upper Big Branch mining disaster of April 2010, in which 29 people died, the former Massey Energy chief executive Don Blankenship was found guilty of willfully violating mine safety and health standards. Sentenced to 12 months in prison, he was released in May last year.

On Tuesday, he could win the Republican nomination for US Senate in West Virginia.

The millionaire is in the middle of a chaotic three-man race, with the US congressman Evan Jenkins and the state attorney general, Patrick Morrisey. The winner will take on an incumbent Democrat, Joe Manchin, in a state Donald Trump won by nearly 40 points.



There are few polls in West Virginia, but those that have been carried out have shown large numbers of undecided voters. The rough consensus among pundits is that Jenkins and Morrisey are neck and neck, with Blankenship just a bit behind. In a state that includes areas of metropolitan Washington and Pittsburgh as well as Appalachian coal fields, it is difficult for any candidate to break through, particularly as registered Republicans are still outnumbered by Democrats.

There are few ideological divides in the Republican race, which has proved a contest to see who can best pledge fealty to Donald Trump and in doing so distance themselves furthest from the Washington swamp he famously pledged to drain.

On Monday morning, Trump weighed in. He did not do so because Blankenship has run controversial television ads in which he talks about “China people”. He attacked because the former CEO is seen to be unelectable in the general election.

“To the great people of West Virginia,” the president tweeted. “We have, together, a really great chance to keep making a big difference. Problem is, Don Blankenship, currently running for Senate, can’t win the General Election in your State … No way! Remember Alabama. Vote Rep. Jenkins or A.G. Morrisey!”

Nationally, Republicans started to run anti-Blankenship ads in April. They did not just focus on the Upper Big Branch disaster. Instead, they attacked him for pumping “toxic coal slurry” underground while using a private system to give his own mansion clean water. The ads ended with a question: “Isn’t there enough toxic sludge in Washington?”

For Blankenship, the Upper Big Branch disaster has actually become a positive. As one national Republican who has worked in West Virginia noted, the candidate has been able to describe his conviction as “a frame job”, claiming: “Obama and Hillary set me up.”

“Not only did it inoculate him to some degree,” the Republican said, “but it actually turned into his rallying cry and his proactive positive message: ‘I’m their enemy, thus, I’m your friend.’”

When Blankenship ran defensive ads on the subject they caused his polling numbers to drop, prompting one well-placed national Republican to say he had a “glass jaw”. But in an increasingly bitter fight between Jenkins and Morrisey, he may yet have a chance.

Before Blankenship’s rise, the race was simply a battle between two wings of the Republican party. Jenkins, a former Democratic state legislator, has been backed by establishment figures in Washington. Morrisey, a former lobbyist who has spent much of his time as state attorney general in litigation with the federal government, has been endorsed by conservative outsiders like Ted Cruz and Rand Paul. Both men constantly tout their support for Trump.

Don Blankenship, then the CEO of Massey Energy, talks with reporters near the Upper Big Branch mine in Montcoal, West Virginia, in 2010. Photograph: Michael Munden / Reuters/Reuters

According to his spokeswoman Nachama Soloveichik, Morrisey has focused “primarily on ideological messages”. The campaign has hit Jenkins repeatedly on his past life as a Democrat, labeling him a liberal handpicked by the party establishment.

In contrast, Jenkins has been hitting Morrisey, who is from New Jersey, as an outsider. His lobbying career in Washington – and that of his wife – has also been a target. The Morriseys’ work for pharmaceutical companies has come under particular scrutiny in a state ravaged by the opioid epidemic.

Jenkins has also attacked Morrisey for his hesitancy to support Trump, going so far as to include in one ad a photoshopped picture of Morrisey shaking hands with Hillary Clinton. In reality, Morrisey was shaking hands with the president.

By savaging each other, the two men may let Blankenship seize the momentum. In a debate last week, Jenkins and Morrisey hammered each other but Blankenship attacked the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, whom he has called by the odd nickname “Cocaine Mitch”. He also defended his use of the term “China person”.

Then Blankenship doubled down. In a controversial ad that ended with him holding two young blonde girls in his arms, he said he stood for “West Virginia people” and not “China people”.

Blankenship’s oddball approach appears to be part of his appeal. As Greg Thomas, a consultant for the former CEO, told the Guardian: “The other candidates are trying to prove how much they are like Trump.

“Don is like Trump.”