Apr 29, 2018 3 min read

In the 1983 song “Sweetheart Like You,” Bob Dylan served up the following observation:

”Steal a little and they throw you in jail.

Steal a lot and they make you king.”

According to a jury of his peers, onetime West Virginia coal baron Don Blankenship stole the lives of 29 miners by conspiring to violate mine safety standards at the Upper Big Branch Mine in 2010, where an explosion took enough lives to fill a typical classroom.

Now, West Virginians could end up crowning him not as king, but as U.S. senator.

Fresh from a one-year stretch in a federal prison in California, Blankenship has returned to the Mountain State, and is running against two other Republicans for the right to take on Democratic incumbent Joe Manchin this November. A March poll had Blankenship, the former CEO of Massey Energy, only 2 points behind U.S. Rep. Evan Jenkins, with the state attorney general, Patrick Morrisey, trailing in third. With 23 percent of Republican voters still undecided, any of the three candidates could win – including Blankenship, who is said to be worth $45 million, so has a substantial store of cash from which to draw.

While we don’t have a dog in this fight, we hope our neighbors to the west and the south come to their senses and make sure Blankenship gets nowhere near Capitol Hill.

In the age of Trump, a segment of the electorate seems willing to forgive all kinds of transgressions, whether it’s having flings with porn stars or ridiculing disabled reporters. But Blankenship’s sins should, in theory at least, be a step too far. A longtime and notorious skinflint, Blankenship was known for thumbing his nose at regulators and obsessing over how much coal was pouring out of the mines he operated. Jowly, scowling, mustachioed and paunchy, he possesses the kind of bearing that would make the villainous banker Mr. Potter from “It’s a Wonderful Life” seem warm and cuddly in comparison.

The Upper Big Branch Mine explosion was the culmination of Blankenship’s well-documented disregard for his workers and anything other than the bottom line. And yet, he has a credible chance of following in the footsteps of such statesmen as Robert Byrd, Jay Rockefeller and Jennings Randolph and representing West Virginia in the United States’ most august body. He has been striking all the notes that would animate hard-right voters, summoning up an enemies list that includes Planned Parenthood and Barack Obama, and has been strenuously arguing he has been persecuted and falsely charged.

The victim of a witch hunt, if you will.

National Republicans see a potential disaster in the making, and have been trying to derail Blankenship’s bid. Of course, Manchin and his campaign probably wouldn’t mind facing Blankenship in the fall, given that the defrocked coal baron carries as much baggage as a jumbo jet on a flight to Europe, but it would be an alarming commentary on the state of our politics if Blankenship makes it that far.

U.S. Sen. John Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, is confident Blankenship will ultimately be rejected when West Virginians head to the polls May 8.

“I still think in the end people are discerning enough that they’ll figure this out,” he said.

We sure hope so.