In the closing days of West Virginia’s Senate primary, relations between Republicans Don Blankenship and U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have turned sour.
Blankenship is running for Senate despite spending a year in jail for conspiring to violate mine safety regulations. A jury found that, under his leadership as CEO of Massey Energy, the company systematically refused to take steps that would have prevented a deadly combination of methane gas and coal dust that left 29 West Virginia miners dead in 2010.
The accusations flew fast and furious in a Fox News-sponsored debate between three Republican Senate contenders in West Virginia.
We’re checking several claims from the May 1 debate, which featured former coal CEO Don Blankenship, U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins, and state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey. Each is running for the nomination to face Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin in the general election.
It’s not every day that PolitiFact fact-checks are wielded as rhetorical weapons in U.S. Senate debates, but that’s exactly what happened in a May 1 debate that pitted three Republican candidates for U.S. Senate in West Virginia.
During the hotly contested campaign, West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey has regularly attacked one of his rivals, U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins, for a history of deviating from conservative orthodoxy.
West Virginia Governor Jim Justice and the Pfizer Foundation Monday announced a grant award of $500,000 to increase rehabilitation services for mothers with substance use disorders and their prenatally exposed infants.
“This funding will help the most vulnerable of our citizens impacted by the horrible drug epidemic we are facing as a state,” said Gov. Justice. “We appreciate the partnership of the Pfizer Foundation with the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources (DHHR) as we work to improve the health and well-being those children and families impacted by substance use.”
“Our hearts go out to the families involved in these tragic accidents along the interstate,” Justice said. “I have instructed Secretary Smith and Colonel Cahill to immediately look at what steps they can take to make sure we are doing everything we possibly can to make our interstates and work zones safe for all motorists as well as those working on the job sites.”
Giving creative ideas the wings to fly is the mission of the Tom Love Innovation Hub at the University of Oklahoma. No matter if the idea is a seed or a full-blown vision.
Maybe you have all the knowledge required, but “just need a cool tool” to complete your project, said Thomas Wavering, executive director on the Innovation Hub.
The Western Wisconsin College of Hair Design and Mortuary Science offers a host of majors to choose from, including diesel mechanics and private investigation. It’s also announced plans to open a new School of Taxidermy in the near future. The university’s official motto is “Meeting Wisconsin’s Workforce Needs Since 2007!”
CLEMSON — Clemson University President James P. Clements is among three dozen national higher education leaders to share their insights and experiences in a new book “Leading Colleges and Universities,” published this month by Johns Hopkins University Press.
Last fall, after watching the death toll from opioids climb unchecked for years, Dr. Rahul Gupta, the man in charge of combating one of the worst health crises in America, decided to do something no one had ever tried.He ordered his staff to do an in-depth analysis of every person in his state who had died of a drug overdose over the preceding year—all 887 of them.
The Pfizer Foundation has awarded a $500,000 grant in West Virginia for rehabilitation services for drug-addicted mothers and their newborns who are born dependent on drugs.
Pharmaceutical companies are shouldering a greater share of the blame for the opioid crisis, according to a new Survey Monkey/Axios poll, although individual users are blamed most often.
Thirty-two states and the District of Columbia have expanded their Medicaid programs for residents earning up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL) under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), though the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the 2012 case, National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, that the federal government could not force them to do so. Additional background on this issue is available here and here.
A company owned by former world heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson plans to partner with a West Virginia greenhouse to grow and extract cannabis for use in its products.
Tyson Holistic is teaming up with Flemington-based Almost Heaven Agriculture and plans to put a hemp extraction facility at its existing greenhouse, officials said Monday.
The leader of the Kentucky House of Representatives is calling for an investigation into the deal that created the Kentucky Wired high-speed internet project, a public-private partnership that has cost the state tens of millions of dollars in delays in recent years.
West Virginia Commerce Secretary Woody Thrasher said President Donald Trump’s 25 percent tariff on steel should not derail China Energy’s plan to build $83.7 billion worth of ethane crackers, power plants and related shale natural gas infrastructure.
I am frequently asked who I think will win the race for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate in West Virginia. Short answer—I don’t know, and I would be crazy to predict. However, I am willing to give you possible scenarios for the three leading candidates, in order of the latest Fox News Poll.
“We knew the program needed a new look to go along with new benefits. We wanted to tap into the history of the program, as well as our Appalachian roots,” Kent Leonhardt said. “We think this new looks captures both of those perfectly.”
Timothy J. Wilmott, CEO for Penn National Gaming, said, “We are grateful to the Mississippi Gaming Commission and the Pennsylvania State Horse Racing Commission for their prompt review and approval of our proposed transaction. Ameristar Vicksburg and The Meadows will be great additions to our Mississippi and Pennsylvania operations, respectively, and we look forward to welcoming their employees and patrons to the Penn National family. As a Company, we are proud that our employees and operations in these states contributed to the record first quarter results announced yesterday. We look forward to securing additional regulatory approvals in the near term and based on our progress to date, we remain confident of closing the transaction in the second half of this year.”
