Free Republic

West Virginia Republican Gov. Jim Justice says he has fired Secretary of Education and the Arts Gayle Manchin ahead of his decision on approved legislation to reorganize the agency. Justice announced the move in a news release Monday. Manchin is a former state school board president and is the wife of Democratic U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin.

In the trend to restore Second Amendment rights across the United States, 22 states have created statutes to protect the right to have arms inside personal means of transportation.  On 27 February, a bill in West Virginia passed the House by an overwhelming majority of 85-14. Here is the Summary From HB 4187: The purpose of this bill is to create the “Business Liability Protection Act”. The bill includes the right to limit possession of firearms on certain premises and definitions. It also provides for misdemeanor criminal offense and penalty. It prohibits employers from certain specific actions against a person...

A lawsuit filed last year by West Virginia's Republican attorney general Patrick Morrisey has resulted in a new Trump administration directive to evaluate the opioid production quota system, which Morrissey says is "responsible for many deaths across the country." Morrisey, who has been attorney general since 2013 and is now running for U.S. Senate, has long viewed the Drug Enforcement Agency's quota system on controlled substances as broken, believing it was setting limits based on sales numbers instead of true medical needs of Americans. He told the Washington Free Beacon he has been digging for information on the system for...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A week ago today, Gov. Jim Justice announced a proposed settlement to West Virginia teachers walkout that barely lasted the evening. Today, Justice received cheers as he signed the bill that will lead to an average 5 percent pay increase for educators. The agreement worked out with legislators also applies an average 5 percent pay increase to other state employees. Schools were expected to open again on Wednesday, bringing to an end a statewide strike that caused classes to be empty for nine days straight. “We have to move away from the idea that education is a...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — There will be no public school next Thursday or Friday anywhere in West Virginia. Whether classes resume on Monday remained up in the air. The West Virginia teachers unions and service personnel organizations all agreed to authorize the first ever walkout in all 55 counties of teachers and service personnel. “We’re done. We’re done waiting. We waited and have given them chances and they didn’t want to take it seriously,” said Teacher Christiana Frye of Cabell Midland High School. “Honestly I’m praying two days is enough because some people can’t afford to be out longer than that,...

WEIRTON, W.Va. — A fired Weirton police officer is getting $175,000 from the Hancock County city as part of a settlement agreement which includes other relief and brings to an end a lawsuit filed in May 2017 challenging his termination. Timothy O’Brien and the American Civil Liberties Union of West Virginia sued Weirton for wrongful termination, due process violations and reputation damage on behalf of former Weirton Officer Stephen Mader. Mader claimed he was fired because he did not shoot a black man with a gun on the night of May 6, 2016 when, as a probationary officer, Mader was...

I can’t understand why Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia remains a Democrat. Ideologically, he is far closer to Mitch McConnell or even Ted Cruz than he is to the Schumer-Pelosi Democrats.  His constituents in the Mountaineer State (“Mountaineer” is the polite word for “Hillbilly”) gave President Trump overwhelming support in 2016, and remain loyal to him.  When it doesn’t matter to the outcome, he can break with the Dems to support the GOP in Senate votes. But when push comes to shove, he is a Party Man. During the State of the Union Address, he visibly surrendered to...

HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Gov. Jim Justice says he’s going to use the West Virginia National Guard to help Huntington respond to the current rash of violence that has resulted in a number of murders including three this week. Gov. Jim Justice talks with WSAZ-TV Anchor Amanda Barren. “I’m going to call upon our National Guard,” Justice said during a Thursday town hall meeting on WSAZ-TV in Huntington. “Our National Guard has resources that can absolutely combat this thing.” Justice said he couldn’t be specific but said the Guard would be working with other police agencies. “That doesn’t mean setting a...

POINT PLEASANT, W.Va. — Point Pleasant Mayor Brian Billings was 10 years old when the Silver Bridge collapsed on Dec. 15, 1967. He will be on hand Friday at a ceremony marking the 50th anniversary of the tragedy. Billings tells MetroNews his message will be clear. “We can’t let this ever go by without remembering, whether it’s 10, 25, 50 years from today, what took place in our city and what was enacted to work towards preventing things like this from happening across our country,” he said. Forty-six people died when the bridge between Point Pleasant and Gallipolis, Ohio fell...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Lawyers for the Mountain Valley Pipeline say if there are delays in the federal court system, the entire project could be delayed by at least a year. The pipeline developers wrote in a recent court filing that they need access to all the property no later than this coming Feb. 1 to comply with a window for tree clearing required by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “If MVP is unable to gain access to commence work on each respective deadline, construction of the entire MVP project may be delayed for as much as one year given...

On November 14, 1970, a chartered jet carrying most of the Marshall University football team clips a stand of trees and crashes into a hillside just two miles from the Tri-State Airport in Kenova, West Virginia. The team was returning from that day’s game, a 17-14 loss to East Carolina University. Thirty-seven Marshall football players were aboard the plane, along with the team’s coach, its doctors, the university athletic director and 25 team boosters–some of Huntington, West Virginia’s most prominent citizens–who had traveled to North Carolina to cheer on the Thundering Herd. “The whole fabric,” a citizen of Huntington wrote...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A company owned by Gov. Jim Justice and his family says it wanted to settle a $4 million debt by selling a helicopter, but the lender hasn’t been cooperating. James C. Companies, Justice Aviation — and the governor personally — were sued in the Southern District of New York in September over default on a loan for the companies’ private helicopter. A little more than $4 million is remaining on the loan. The plaintiff, Citizens Asset Finance, wants to foreclose and take back the helicopter. In an answer filed on Friday, lawyers for Justice and his companies...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A man on his way to a Bluefield drug rehab facility took off in the ambulance after the driver had stopped to help a second crew member. The stop occurred Tuesday night on Interstate 77 just east of Charleston. According to police, the Priority Ambulance driver stopped because the patient was struggling with his fellow crew member in the back of the vehicle. He stopped to help and then the patient took off in the ambulance. He later let the female crew member out of the ambulance. The man–driving the ambulance–was later pulled over in downtown Charleston....

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Federal regulators have approved two major natural gas pipelines that would start in West Virginia and supply the eastern seaboard. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission granted certificates to both the Atlantic Coast Pipeline and the Mountain Valley Pipeline on Friday evening. The pipelines would transport gas from the Utica and Marcellus shale deposits. One of the commissioners dissented, calling the public interest of the projects into question. Additional necessary permits are pending at the state level in both West Virginia and Virginia. The $5.1 billion Atlantic Coast Pipeline would span 600 miles from Harrison County and across...

*** Following an exclusive interview with Bossie on Thursday, Breitbart News reported: “We support Patrick Morrisey for Senate because he has a proven record of results fighting for conservative West Virginia values and against the harmful liberal agenda of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton,” Bossie added. “Attorney General Morrisey was there to take on executive overreach at the Obama Environmental Protection Agency for the coal miners and he’s been there to support President Trump’s agenda taking on sanctuary cities and pushing for much needed tax reform. I look forward to working with Patrick Morrisey to enact President Trump’s conservative agenda...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — United Mine Workers Union President Cecil Roberts says the West Virginia Supreme Court stepped beyond its authority in its decision on the attempted overturning of the state’s right-to-work law. Y “They basically told her (Kanawha County Circuit Judge Jennifer Bailey) how to rule, which is not what they should have done. They, as they say, ‘got over their skis on this,'” Roberts said. UMWA President Cecil Roberts was a guest Thursday on 580 Live on 580 WCHS Radio in Charleston. Roberts gave his take on the case during an appearance Thursday on the talk show 580-Live on...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Gov. Jim Justice, who switched parties to become a Republican in early August, told a crowd of Republican lawmakers this week that he supports Democratic Senator Joe Manchin’s re-election to the U.S. Senate. Manchin, a former governor who has served in the U.S. Senate since 2010, is in what most political observers consider to be a hotly-contested election in 2018. Congressman Evan Jenkins and state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey are running in the Republican primary. Governor Justice was speaking to Republicans on Monday evening at the state Culture Center. He addressed his desire to pass a multi-million...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Companies owned by Gov. Jim Justice and his family are being sued in federal court in Kentucky, accused of fraudulently transferring property to avoid responsibilities in a business deal that was the subject of a related lawsuit a few years ago. The lawsuit wants punitive damages of at least $16.9 million. “This agreement was an unlawful and corrupt agreement by the conspirators to accomplish an unlawful goal of fraudulently transferring or liquidating valuable real estate belonging to Justice Companies, so that plaintiffs could not collect on debts owed to them by Justice companies,” the lawsuit alleges. The...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The state Supreme Court has overruled a lower court injunction that blocked West Virginia’s right-to-work law, chastising a circuit judge for the pace of decision-making and for issuing the injunction in the first place. The state’s unions failed to establish the likelihood of success based on the merits of three constitutional claims, wrote Justice Menis Ketchum in the court’s majority opinion. The state AFL-CIO issued a statement noting that the Supreme Court ruling applied specifically to the injunction, saying unions will continue to fight during a broader hearing in circuit court and anticipating an eventual appeal of...

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — It’s possible there could be additional delays before a decision is made on the constitutionality of the West Virginia Workplace Freedom Act following an hour of oral arguments Tuesday before the state Supreme Court. Justice Margaret Workman questioned the decision by the office of state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey to bring the right-to-work law to the Supreme Court before there’s been a full hearing on the merits of the case in circuit court. “I just think you all are taking a shortcut coming up here wanting all of the answers without the lower court having made any...