Convicted Coal Baron Don Blankenship Announces Third-Party Run for President: Trump ‘Simply Cannot Get it Done’

Former West Virginia Senate candidate Don Blankenship has announced a third-party run for the presidency, arguing President Donald Trump “simply cannot get it done.”

“President Trump means well, but he simply cannot get it done because he is too busy mending his self-inflicted wounds and tripping over his ego,” Blankenship said in his announcement.

Blankenship announced on his website that he was running for the Constitution Party nomination for 2020, a far-right party that has been called an extremist group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The former CEO of coal extractor Massey Energy Company, Blankenship was sentenced to a year in prison in 2016 for a misdemeanor conviction of conspiring to violate safety regulations after a mine explosion killed 29 people but was acquitted on several felony charges.

Blankenship insisted he was falsely convicted in his campaign announcement, saying he “was indicted as part of an effort by government officials to hide the fact that government regulators likely caused the mine explosion.”

Blankenship filed a $12 billion defamation suit against dozens of news outlets and media personalities for incorrectly referring to him as a “felon” during his 2018 run for Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin’s seat. Blankenship ultimately came up short in the Republican primary against establishment candidate Patrick Morrissey, who went on to lose to Manchin in the general election

Blankenship’s Senate campaign rose to national prominence after he ran an ad dubbing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell “Cocaine Mitch” and called Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao‘s father a “wealthy Chinaperson.”

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