Did Joe Manchin block climate action to benefit his financial interests?

Nancy Hilsbos, a former coalminer living in the West Virginia county that Senator Joe Manchin calls home, barely noticed the nondescript office block she passed almost daily.

Manchin was recently revealed to have quietly made millions of dollars from Enersystems over the past three decades as the only supplier of a low grade coal to a high-polluting power plant near Fairmont. That came as news to Hilsbos and just about everyone else in the city.

In 2020, Manchin earned nearly half a million dollars from the company, and $5.6m over the previous decade.

But Hilsbos, who worked underground for 13 years and was also a union activist, is less bothered by the senator keeping the source of his wealth shielded than by what else may have been hidden from view.

Hilsbos is not alone in her concern.

Regan said the senator spent years cultivating an image of himself as his own man, above party politics.

For all that, Greg Thomas, a prominent West Virginia Republican operative and Manchin opponent, does not think the coal plant revelations will damage the senator with most voters.

Then there is Trump. West Virginia voted for him in both presidential elections by the largest margin of any state except Wyoming.