Party Primaries Are a Problem for the GOP

Tomorrow, Republican voters in West Virginia head to the polls to decide who will be the party’s nominee in the Senate contest against Senator Joe Manchin. Manchin is a longtime figure in the Mountain State, but as a Democrat in one of the most pro-Trump places in the country, he is vulnerable.

Three main Republican candidates are in competition. There is Representative Evan Jenkins, a member of Congress from West Virginia’s third congressional district; Attorney General Patrick Morrisey; and Don Blankenship, a former coal-mining executive who went to prison for his part in the Upper Big Branch disaster, which led to the deaths of more than two dozen miners.

No doubt, it would be imprudent for West Virginia Republicans to nominate Blankenship. Yet the party establishment is worried that this is precisely what they will do tomorrow. Blankenship has been spending millions of dollars of his own money on  television, while Morrisey and Jenkins have mostly attacked each other. Public polling has shown Jenkins in the lead, but it is sparse, and reports of private polling suggest that Blakenship is surging at the last minute.

It is possible that Blankenship, should he be nominated, could win the general election against Manchin. But West Virginia offers perhaps the most promising chance for the GOP to pick up a Senate seat in November, and nominating a character like Blankenship would be a blessing for the Democrats. On top of his criminal conviction, Blankenship has also said extremely racist things in the last few weeks. So, even if he won, his presence in the Senate would be an embarrassment to Senate Republicans.

It’s easy to blame the voters of West Virginia for this mess. They should know better than to give a former convict a shot at the GOP nomination for the Senate. One might also blame the party elites in Washington, D.C., who should have worked more forcefully to prevent Blankenship from standing a chance in the first place.