Author: Don Blankenship
Tomorrow, I will be forwarding my most recent federal court filings to President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions. If the President and the Attorney General truly want to understand how unfair and dishonest the Department of Justice (DOJ) is, they will, at the least, invest a few minutes to read these motions. If they read them, the President and Mr. Sessions will clearly see that my “misdemeanor conviction” was fraudulently achieved and that my conviction must be invalidated. More importantly, they will learn that the DOJ is an immoral organization and that criminal justice reform must include reforming DOJ.…
What is left of the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia just ruled to uphold the Secretary of State’s decision to deny my access to the General election ballot. For those who believe in democracy, it is a frightening decision. Essentially, the Republican Party can now slander a candidate throughout the Primary, effectively denying that candidate an equal opportunity to win the nomination, and simultaneously pass a law in the middle of an election cycle which prohibits the slandered person from being on the General election ballot. Americans desperately need to pay attention as the politicians continue to move…
On Thursday, August 23rd, @DonBlankenship released the following tweets: The U.S. Treasury has paid out millions of dollars to settle sexual harassment and discrimination claims made against members of Congress. Question for Congress: How does the secret settlement of hundreds (268) of sexual harassment and other discrimination claims against members of Congress differ legally from actions taken by President Trump? At least Trump and not taxpayers funded his hush payments. How can congressmen argue that money secretly paid to hush their accusers was not paid to influence their elections? Does this mean that the Treasury Department employees who directed that…
A ruling yesterday by a Federal judge in North Carolina should put one of West Virginia Republican Party Chairman Melody Potter’s concerns to rest. Melody had said she was concerned that a ruling by the West Virginia Supreme Court allowing me access to the fall election ballot would cause West Virginia to be a “legal outlier.” Melody should find comfort in the fact that a Federal Judge’s ruling to allow three “sore loser” candidates on the ballot in North Carolina is nearly directly on point with my case. In North Carolina, the state Legislature, much like West Virginia, enacted a…
The Republican Party has filed a motion to the West Virginia Supreme Court asking the court to let them “intercede” in my efforts to get on the election ballot as a member of the Constitution Party. The Republicans claim that they fear a “splintering and excessive factionalism” of their party. They say they want to guard against divisive “intra-party” fights “after the party has chosen its nominee.” But the Republicans are ignoring the fact that the “factionalism” they claim to want to prevent “after the primary” has actually been created by the party itself “during the primary.” Melody Potter, the…
Today, Judge Joe Goodwin’s son Booth was on the Hoppy Kercheval show. I called into the show personally, but as you would expect, the Hoppy show declined my request that I be allowed to immediately respond to Goodwin’s lies. Among the interesting things that Booth said was that the Court (a court where his Dad is one of the senior federal Judges) will rule against my motions to invalidate my conviction. Booth said on the program that he is “certain” that his Dad’s court will rule against me. Booth is talking about motions he has not seen and that have…
Don Blankenship released the following statement today regarding the release of the report from the Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility concerning his case: “Some are saying that OPR found no Brady violations. But the truth is that they did. They just aren’t saying that they found any. That’s no big surprise, as they cannot even find the MSHA inspector emails. And no one will ever find the UBB documents that the investigators shredded in Beckley. How could OPR possibly know what is in any of the shredded documents, let alone whether they contain Brady material? As our previous…
Today, the Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) released the findings of its investigation into the prosecutors in Don Blankenship’s case. OPR determined that former U.S. Attorney Booth Goodwin and former Assistant U.S. Attorney Steve Ruby both committed “professional misconduct” during Don’s prosecution. Additionally, OPR found that Goodwin and Ruby “recklessly” disregarded their discovery obligations and violated DOJ’s own policies by failing to turn over dozens of materials they were required to disclose to the defense. Specifically, OPR found that Ruby and Goodwin failed to disclose sixty-one memoranda of witness interviews that should have been provided to Don’s…
Today my attorneys filed a petition with the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia and requested that the Court order the West Virginia Secretary of State to correct its recent decision to deny me access to the 2018 General Election ballot as the Constitution Party’s candidate for U.S. Senate. The petition makes clear that the law relied upon by the Secretary of State in denying my ballot access is flawed in multiple ways and violates the Constitutions of both West Virginia and the United States. The following is a layman explanation of some of the flaws of the law…
Constitution Party nominee for U.S. Senate, Don Blankenship, sent the below letter today to West Virginia legislative leaders, Senate President Mitch Carmichael and Speaker Tim Armstead. The letter requests an investigation into actions taken by Attorney General Patrick Morrisey and the West Virginia legislature. It also serves as a FOIA request for any communication between the Office of the Attorney General and members and staff of the Legislature regarding election law legislation that was passed during the 2018 legislative session. Separately, Blankenship’s attorneys will be filing a brief in the near future to challenge the West Virginia Secretary of State’s…