West Virginia GOP candidate Don Blankenship releases ad attacking Mitch McConnell's 'China family'

(Image credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

last updated 4 May 2018

Don Blankenship may not win West Virginia's upcoming Republican Senate primary, but he's No. 1 when it comes to releasing campaign ads featuring bizarre nicknames and racist descriptions of people's relatives.

In a completely monotone voice, Blankenship — a former coal executive who spent a year in jail after the 2010 Upper Big Branch Mine disaster, which left 29 miners dead — said: "Swamp Captain Mitch McConnell has created millions of jobs for Chinapeople. While doing so, Mitch has gotten rich; in fact his China family has given him tens of millions of dollars. Mitch's swamp people are now running false negative ads against me. They're also childishly calling me 'despicable' and 'mentally ill.' The war to drain the swamp and create jobs for West Virginia people has begun. I will beat Joe Manchin and ditch Cocaine Mitch for the sake of the kids."

Translation: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is married to Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, whose father, James Chao, was born in China. He is a very rich man, thanks to the shipping company he started. "Cocaine Mitch" is apparently a nod to a 2014 report in The Nation about cocaine that was found aboard a ship owned by Chao's company. McConnell is the "swamp captain" because he's part of the Republican establishment, and Joe Manchin is West Virginia's Democratic senator, up for re-election. I have no idea who the "swamp people" are, nor do I want to.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Explore More

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

Subscribe to The Week

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox