October 15, 2004

Massey CEO gives $1.7 million to anti-Warren McGraw group

By Toby Coleman
Staff writer

Don Blankenship, the chief executive officer of Massey Energy Co., said Thursday that he has given $1.7 million to a group that wants to oust state Supreme Court Justice Warren McGraw.

The group, called And for the Sake of the Kids, has spent $2.4 million on a series of ads calling McGraw soft on crime for voting to give convicted sex offender Tony D. Arbaugh Jr. another chance at probation.

In a written statement issued by the group, Blankenship said he is financing the group because “without a change in the Supreme Court, businesses will continue to avoid West Virginia” and the state’s “job shortage” will continue. He did not mention the Arbaugh case.

McGraw’s campaign said Blankenship’s involvement with the group proves that out-of-state businesses are trying to manipulate the election and take control of the high court.

“We have said all along that special interests are trying to buy this election in a bid to tell West Virginians how to vote and to deny them the right to elect their own judges,” McGraw campaign manager Andy Gallagher said in a written statement.

The campaign of McGraw’s Republican challenger, Brent Benjamin, said Blankenship’s huge contributions would not sway Benjamin’s decision if he were elected.

“Brent Benjamin has been very clear that when he is on the Supreme Court, justice will not be for sale,” said campaign spokesman Steve Cohen. “He is running to bring an end to special interest justice on the Supreme Court.”

This year, special interest groups have spent far more than any of the candidates for the 12-year Supreme Court seat up for grabs.

Ads hammering McGraw from groups like And for the Sake of the Kids have been countered by an organization funded by plaintiff’s lawyers called West Virginia Consumers for Justice.

The group, which has spent more than $1 million so far this year, has spent $500,000 in recent weeks to run ads painting Benjamin as a puppet of big business who is lying about McGraw’s record. Benjamin denies those accusations.

Charleston attorney Tim Bailey, a spokesman for the organization’s biggest backer, Consumer Attorneys of West Virginia, said the more than $900,000 his group has spent on the effort was money “given by West Virginians in the interest of protecting West Virginians.”

“For all of the accusations that fly around about trial lawyers trying to buy a seat on the Supreme Court, I think that the trail of money makes it very clear who is trying to buy the court, and that is fat cat Don Blankenship,” Bailey said.

Blankenship, the CEO of Richmond-based Massey since 1992, received $6 million in compensation last year, according to an analysis by the Sunday Gazette-Mail. Under his leadership, the company’s mining subsidiaries have been citied repeatedly for dumping coal waste into streams and violating other environmental laws.

His company is fighting a number of lawsuits that could end up in front of the Supreme Court in the next few years, including workers’ compensation claims, multimillion-dollar jury verdicts and a massive class-action suit accusing of using mining practices that add to Southern West Virginia’s flooding problems.

In a written statement issued by And for the Sake of the Kids, Blankenship said he sees his donations to the group as an attempt to make the state a better place to live.

“Today most children growing up in West Virginia accept the fact that there is no future for them here,” he said. “My own son, who is a student at Marshall University, today will face that same challenge. All of us should do what we can to make West Virginia a state where all of our kids can have a bright future.”

He also compared his political giving to a charitable enterprise.

“Over the years, I and the companies for which I worked have donated millions to West Virginia charities,” he said. “However, I decided this summer that the most productive donation I could make to my fellow West Virginians was to help defeat Warren McGraw.”

The reason: “Warren votes almost every time for plaintiffs and against job providers — unless the Charleston Gazette is the defendant.”

Blankenship has been able to give so much money to And for the Sake of the Kids because it is organized as an independent political organization. These groups are frequently called 527s, after the section of the federal tax code under which they are established.

In all, the group collected $2.5 million from 12 donors between Aug. 20 and Sept. 30. Most of the donors are executives in coal operations, like Jenmar Corp. in Pennsylvania and Nelson Brothers in Alabama.

The group also received $745,000 from Doctors for Justice, a Wheeling group that fears McGraw will strike down medical malpractice liability caps, and $1,000 from Raleigh County coal operator Tracy Hylton, the man whom McGraw defeated in 1972 to win a seat in the state Senate.

After the election, Blankenship said, he will start a foundation also called And for the Sake of the Kids to “provide needed clothing and other necessities to the most needy children of West Virginia.” He said that he intends to help the foundation raise an amount “similar” to $1.7 million in the coming years.

To contact staff writer Toby Coleman, use e-mail or call 348-5156.