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These words from Wendell Berry's 'Farming' rushed into my mind like a gentle wind at evening's neigh. 'All that I serve will die… like a tree in a field, passing without haste or regret… my life a patient willing descent into the grass.'

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<h5 style="text-align: center;">Through out the campaign, I will post prose that represents the hollers of Appalachia we know best in HD 85. </h5>Saturday, March 28The MurmurThere’s a murmur moving through these hills,and it is not the wind.The dogs know it first,throwing their voices against the ridge linelike the mountain answered back wrong.Even the road feels tighter underfoot,like it’s bracing.It showed up at the courthouse steps,folding chairs biting into marble dust,coffee thinned to the color of creek water in August.Men arguing about SNAPlike hunger is a stain that spreads on its own.Arguing about women’s health-they’ve never sat beside a pregnant twelve year oldtrying to memorize algebrabetween doctor’s appointments.Preaching about vaccineslike we didn’t once chase down the greatest medical miracle and call it polio cured.Women with Aitken’s Bibles tucked deep in their purses,pages like decorative dish towels with gold trim,verses about loaves and fishespressed between lipstick and receipts.I hope they read the red letters slow.You can feel it in the creek before it floods.Water pulls itself close.Sycamores flash their pale underarms.Cows settle heavy in the pasture.Even the crows hold their cawlike they know sound carries.They talk about three strikes for mercyas if grace keeps score.They talk about who deserves clean waterin a state where wells run poison.They shake hands in Charlestonwhile foster kids age outwith no familyand no porch light waiting.I know an elderly womanwho fills milk jugs from her neighbor’s hosebecause a hospital stayturned her water bill into a cliff.Her hands tremble in the coldbut she thanks him with cookies.My Jesus is the neighbor with the spigot,boots unlaced,waving her over.Not the utility companystacking fees like firewood.I know a man who met Narcan eight times.Eight sharp blue mornings.Eight returns from the edge of the creek bankwhere the mud sucks at your heels.Now he stands in church basementsunder humming fluorescent lights,telling the shaking onestheir names still matter.Breath is not a sin.Coming back is not weakness.It is resurrection with track marks.I know a woman who once counted SNAP dollarsat the Dollar Generalwith her chin lifted high.Now she counts heartbeats.Scrubs crisp as frost,nursing degree framed on a paneled wallthat used to hold eviction notices.Help was not her ending.It was her bridge.I know a child who eats on weekendsbecause neighbors in her hollerdo not let cupboards echo.There is always a pot of beans on low.Cornbread sweating in a cast iron skillet.A knock that sounds casualbut carries salvation in foil pans.There’s a line at the food pantrycurving soft as the Elk River bend.Nobody in it looks like a headline.They look like us.Boots dirty.Hair pinned up with pencils.Disabled.The working poor.Breath fogging in chemical valley airthat smells faintly of metal and prosperity.So before you tell mewho’s worthy of breador breathor one more chance,come sit at this table.Hear the door slap shut.Tell them no yourself.Eye to eyeAnd see if your voice shakes.-Jenny Keener----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Palm SundayFor The Dead of West Virginia, Still Waiting for a Better Day&nbsp;Our ancestors are sown into pocket graveyards&nbsp;&nbsp;throughout these mountains, private plots&nbsp;&nbsp;lucky to be mown monthly by some volunteer&nbsp;from the Presbyterian church or an inmate&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;from the county jail. Their headstones lean&nbsp;&nbsp;into the hillsides, and they wait patiently,&nbsp;bony wrists crossed, for the new body&nbsp;&nbsp;they were promised from the pulpit&nbsp;&nbsp;as they sat aching on bare wood pews&nbsp;&nbsp;after six-day work weeks felling and barking&nbsp;timber, or killing and cooking chickens, or wielding&nbsp;&nbsp;a pick and shovel in a four-foot seam&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;half-a-mile inside a mountain. This isn’t&nbsp;to say&nbsp;&nbsp;they didn’t&nbsp;know love and joy, that they didn’t&nbsp;&nbsp;revel in pleasure and play. They held their children&nbsp;in their laps, and sang loud and out of tune, and fought&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;and laughed, of course, because that is the unkillable kernel&nbsp;&nbsp;at the heart of being human. But know this: they never knew&nbsp;&nbsp;any work that didn’t&nbsp;hurt, and they only ever worked&nbsp;&nbsp;because they had to, because there had to be a better life&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;beyond this one. But there they lie, still moldering, still&nbsp;&nbsp;waiting, and maybe beginning&nbsp;to believe they were sold&nbsp;&nbsp;a bill of goods, and this hole is the only home they’ll&nbsp;ever know,&nbsp;&nbsp;from here on out, forever&nbsp;and ever, Amen.&nbsp;-Doug Van Gundy, Elkins WV------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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The Democratic Primary takes place May 12th, and early voting opens April 29th. All are welcome to vote. Registration ends April 21st. Make your voice heard!

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&nbsp;It makes my blood boil when confronting the truth about Charleston today:&nbsp;&nbsp;That the GOP spent the last decade gleefully abandoning Mountaineer families in need of good shelter, medical, education, clean water, affordable utilities, and jobs.

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<h2>Bonney Receives Primary Endorsement from Corridor H, Finish it!</h2>'"We believe Dean Bonney understands the importance of infrastructure and economic development in his region. We support candidates who recognize the value of projects like Corridor H, US 48, and its impact on local communities."I will work hard to complete Corridor H to the Virginia border. If elected, I will reach out to my friends in the Virginia legislature to discuss Richmond funding from the border to I-81.

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<h2 style="text-align: center;">I am running as a servant leader proudly representing HD 85 constituents in Charleston.</h2><h3 style="text-align: center;">A servant-leader focuses on the growth and well-being of the people and the communities to which they belong.</h3><h3 style="text-align: center;">The engagement a servant leader practices in the legislature is built on the witness and trust of the communities represented.</h3><img src="https://run.imgix.net/e40d9f74-fd89-4d51-9d87-527bf2ff8607/9374c079-bb0b-4c0c-be66-34b9dbcf9b03/9374c079-bb0b-4c0c-be66-34b9dbcf9b03.jpg?ixlib=js-3.8.0&amp;bri=0&amp;con=0&amp;sat=0&amp;high=0&amp;shad=0&amp;usm=0&amp;rect=363%2C808%2C1905%2C3224&amp;w=1500" alt="" caption="" align="left" alignwidth="40" tiltdirection="left" variant="framed"><h3 style="text-align: center;">I was selected for trust and leadership regarding election integrity in the Virginia Commonwealth by both Republican and Democratic administrations, and I will bring that same type of experience and engagement to Charleston on behalf of HD 85.</h3>

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End the giveaway to out-of-state private schools.&nbsp;&nbsp;I will fight to end the Hope Scholarship, a fiscal Armageddon for taxpayers, and repurpose those funds to our struggling school districts.

Few things impact a child more than their education. A brighter tomorrow for West Virginia starts with a brighter today for our children.

Restore our Public Schools

The highest ACA premiums in West Virginia increased by over 133% on average, with some plans seeing a tenfold increase for 2026. Folks, we have an insurance market place in WV called PEIA and expanding participation to private employers and individuals will make us all healthier: body, mind, and checkbook. I will deliver a bill, PEIA for ALL Mountaineers, and fight for its passage in 2027.

'PEIA is a participant in the health insurance market place. It should act like one.' Sam Petsonk - West Virginia Watch

PEIA for All

An open forum for all candidates is being hosted by the Grant County Chamber of Commerce.

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I have not talked to a single Mountaineer who would prefer to die from a stroke or heart attack for a $5 paycheck increase from a tax cut. I will fight to redirect the Governor’s proposed $ 125M annual tax cut to support rural healthcare, emergency medical services, and PEIA expansion for all Mountaineers.

Healthcare is everyone's right. Nobody should ever have to go without because it is too far away or too expensive. WV has an established health insurance marketplace: PEIA. Let's open PEIA to private industry and individual group plan participation.

Maintain &amp; Improve Access to Rural Healthcare

Legal Ghost Corporations dropping the full weight of their connected private and government operations onto the pastoral soils of rural America will become the modern day version of the Battle of Blair Mountain if the peoples houses in state Capitals do not put the brakes on. Currently the GOP in Charleston has given a green light to total destruction of our headwaters and arable land in return for a handful of minimum wage jobs at these facilities. The Speaker of the House is taking special interest in destroying our environment by taking on Fundamental Data as a client in his day job at Bowles Rice. In my years of advocacy for social services both locally and at the state level, I never knew of legislation created without public comment, shoved through session at the 11th hour, and adversarial to the communities affected to be good for the people that live there. My first bill will be to restore public comment and end the use of NDAs for both public and private lands where regulated industries are planned.

No Data Centers. Not now.&nbsp;&nbsp;Not ever.&nbsp;&nbsp;Our environment is too fragile to accommodate the largest data center in the US.

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Protect Our Fragile Environment

I have been paying residential property taxes in Tucker County since 2015. I will work in the state assembly to expand the BUILD WV Act by lowering barriers to entry and by improving incentives to provide more affordable housing opportunities within HD85.

Housing costs are going up while wages stay the same. It is an injustice to any hard working West Virginian to not be able to afford a roof over their head.

Improve Incentives For Affordable Housing

I have family in Portland OR and LA and have witnessed what ICE has wrought in these communities. The cruelty is the point as these pardoned J6 marauders and their Proud Boy and 3 Percenter compatriots mask up like the vigilantes of Reconstruction. They are untrained, unqualified, and unworthy of our support. It was never about returning the worst of the worst to their homelands. It has always been about smashing what Trump calls, 'The Enemy Within.'Counties around HD 85 are among a growing number of West Virginia law enforcement organizations officially partnering with ICE through 287(g) agreements enabling designated local officers to perform certain immigration officer functions under ICE’s direction and oversight. I will work to end this cooperation!

Billions in taxpayer dollars have been given to ICE, yet they have no duty to protect or serve the communities they have been placed in. We protect us, always.

Keep ICE Out!

I will fight to stop any utility deregulation that will hurt consumers, and move to eliminate the industry free-loaders from our grid who have not invested in utility infrastructure commensurate with their rate of use.

Corporations are the ones driving up utility rates and yet citizens are footing the bill. Make those responsible pay their fair share.

End Consumer Utility Subsidies for Industry

What happened at the Mettiki mine in Tucker County in February was shameful. Our Secretary of State, State Delegates and State Senators did nothing to prevent the largest payroll in the county from moving across the border to Virginia. Worse, in the last 50 years, Charleston has proven completely inept at securing businesses and industries that generate the types of payrolls that the coal industry produced for so long.The first economic bill I will introduce or sponsor will be to require the Secretary of State to monitor the actions of major industries and businesses to ensure that we do everything possible to retain good coal and other payrolls in WV.To the broader structural issues, we will not have a state if we cannot stabilize our rural communities. I will begin a dialogue in Charleston that will focus on establishing a universal basic income for both displaced and unplaced workers that is based on the national income average.The demise of both extraction industry payrolls and IT payrolls affected by AI cannot be overcome, in my opinion, with the same old same old bromides and bravura tied to current failed WV economic development policies. Universal basic income is an approach to stabilizing communities in the short to medium term, in order to create opportunities for rediscovering and retraining for employment that AI is least efficient at accomplishing.

Taking care of our community means keeping money in the hands of those who need it, not corporations.

Protect Coal Miner Payrolls and Benefits

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Veterans Appreciation Luncheon

The purpose of this event is to thank, appreciate, and listen to veterans, to hear from them about their needs, and how they feel both the state and the federal government should function to best meet their needs, the needs of their families, and their communities.Those who plan to attend, call 304-478-3519 so that enough lunch is prepared!

I have been on both sides of the Corridor H issue. The data center moved me to supporting Go North! I have determined that going North will keep the community ties between Thomas and Davis much stronger and will be the least disruptive to our communities. I will fight for the preservation of the Blackwater Canyon and the preservation of the dark new moon skies above it.

Protect the Blackwater canyon. Maintain community ties. Reduce noise pollution.