The battle for Joe Manchin’s vote
Joe Manchin may be enjoying the limelight as the chief Democratic holdout on the Biden administration’s trillion-dollar-plus Build Back Better legislation. It’s been variously reported that Manchin, the linchpin vote in a 50-50 Senate, loves the attention he’s getting, even as he barks at reporters – the media scrum – on Capitol Hill.
Basking in the spotlight has its downside, however.
A recent story in the New York Times puzzles out the competition for Manchin’s Build Back Better vote between two anchors of the senator’s home state political base: the coal industry, on one hand, and the United Mine Workers, on the other.
The UMW wants Congress to pass BBB. Coal and allied fossil fuel interests want it killed.
Where, eventually, will Manchin land on BBB? That’s the billion – excuse me – trillion-dollar question. Washington has been tied in knots for months waiting for an answer.
According to Times’ reporter Jonathan Weisman, the answer is likely to come about as a result of the Manchin-centered tug-of-war between coal mine owners and mine workers.
The union made its views known a few days before Christmas. Speaking for the union, UMW president Cecil Roberts noted BBB “includes several items that we believe are important for our members and their communities.”
Maybe the most immediately important item is the continued vitality of the miners’ black lung benefits fund.
“The bill contains … language that would extend the current fee paid by coal companies to fund benefits,” Roberts noted. “But now that fee will be cut in half” starting Jan. 1.
In addition, Roberts stated, “the bill includes language that will provide tax incentives to encourage manufacturers to build facilities in the coalfields that would employ thousands of coal miners who have lost their jobs.
“We support that and are ready to help supply those plants with a trained, professional workforce. But now the potential for those jobs is significantly threatened.”
As Weisman writes, the union has seen the handwriting on the wall and is ready to act. It realizes, finally, that coal, if not a dying industry, is a rapidly fading one.
BBB provides a generous tax credit for manufacturers investing in clean energy facilities located in old coal towns and in communities which once hosted coal-fired electric generation plants.
The hoped-for result is that the region we call home will became a union-based, manufacturing hub for such things as wind turbines and solar panels.
In addition, BBB sets aside billions of dollars for the clean up of orphaned mines, training for displaced workers, and “breakthrough” carbon-capture technologies, as well as other projects directed at aged-out communities of coal.
Finally, BBB would make it easier to form unions – a key to high-wage, family-sustaining jobs – by penalizing, in Roberts’ words, “outlaw employers that deny workers their rights to form a union on the job.”
Roberts deems the bill “critical to any long-term ability to restore the right to organize in America in the face of ramped-up union-busting by employers.
“For those and other reasons, we … urge Senator Manchin to revisit his opposition to this legislation and work with his colleagues to pass something that will help keep coal miners working, and have a meaningful impact on our members, their families, and their communities.”
Politics is frequently a struggle between competing interests. As regards Build Back Better, Charles Hamilton of the West Virginia Coal Association, an industry group, scolded the union “for waving the white flag.”
“We would have thought they would go down swinging. I don’t think they should be trading one job for another,” Hamilton said, “particularly fossil fuel energy jobs, which are extremely well paid and carry benefits.”
Will Manchin’s ties to the coal industry tip the balance in the bosses’ favor? He and his family are wealthy because of their coal holdings. Beside, Manchin benefits politically from campaign donations directed his way by the coal, oil, and gas industries. Indeed in recent years, no senator has received more fossil fuel money than the senator from West Virginia.
Some political observers think Manchin foolhardy for resisting BBB in some form while clinging to mine owner support. They point out that when he ran for reelection in 2018 against Republican Patrick Morrisey, whom he barely beat, owners threw their support to Morrisey.
It’s likely Manchin isn’t thinking in such either/or terms. He may want to split the difference. But can he, will he? Stay tuned.
Richard Robbins lives In Uniontown. He can be reached at dick.l.robbins@gmail.com.