Blankenship launches third-party bid for West Virginia Senate seat, faces likely legal challenge to candidacy
Former coal baron Don Blankenship, who came in third in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate in West Virginia with 20 percent of the vote, announced yesterday he would run in the general election as the Constitution Party nominee.
He will likely have to fight for his candidacy in the courts before he faces Patrick Morrisey (R) and incumbent Sen. Joe Manchin (D) in November. West Virginia has a "sore loser law" which prohibits a candidate who lost a major party primary from running for the same seat again as a third-party or independent candidate.
Blankenship said, "Although the establishment will likely begin their efforts against us by mounting a legal challenge to my candidacy, we are confident that — if challenged — our legal position will prevail, absent a politically motivated decision by the courts."
Richard Winger, noted ballot access expert, commented over the weekend that the new “sore loser law” that was signed into law in March will not take effect until June, 90 days after it was signed. “Whether the old law would block him is not clear,” said Winger.
He foreshadowed his run in a web video criticizing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who he accused of improperly intervening in the election during the primary. "As for Mitch's thanking Don Blankenship for playing in what Mitch considers his Senate sandbox, Don has not quit playing in it, yet," the narrator says.
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