West Virginia is leading the nation in economic growth under President Trump
Governor Jim Justice says he's thankful that coal miners put candidate Hillary Clinton out of business in 2016.
West Virginia Governor Jim Justice said Friday that since his state’s economy is growing under President Trump, he's thankful that coal miners put candidate Hillary Clinton out of business in 2016 after she threatened coal miners’ jobs on the campaign trail.
“It surely wasn’t helpful. I don’t think she was thinking. And I’m just really happy to God above that a bunch of coal miners helped put her out of business. That was the very best thing that could’ve happened to this country,” Justice (R) told "Fox & Friends."
Clinton famously vowed in 2016 to "put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business" through policies geared toward new energy sources. She lost every county in the state to Trump after drawing the ire of coal miners and the state led the nation in GDP growth and personal income growth in the first quarter of 2019.
IN WEST VIRGINIA SENATE RACE, COAL MINING TAKES CENTER STAGE
After attributing West Virginia's GDP growth to Trump, Justice said he and Trump are similar in that both are former businessmen, not career politicians.
The governor went on to say, “In West Virginia, when I walked in the door we were dead last. And now just think, can you imagine in West Virginia we were first in construction jobs, second in revenue, first in personal income growth, first now in GDP. I mean, we are rolling, but there's a lot of things going on in West Virginia today. We’re proud to have our miners back to work but we have tourism, manufacturing, roads, lots of stuff going on.”
After speaking with President Trump shortly after the Robert Mueller hearing, Justice shared the president’s thoughts on the event, saying the president “thought it was pitiful.”
Justice joked that Mueller "looked like a raccoon who'd been chased by a pack of hounds," saying it was "terrible" that the investigation went on for two years.