Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky
blocked help for the pensions and health care for 120,000
retired miners and their families in West Virginia, the Washington Post
reported.
There was bipartisan
support for a plan to save the fund, but the Majority Leader wouldn’t allow it
to happen.
McConnell’s office blocked efforts to
rescue health and pension funds on which thousands of retired and disabled
miners rely. Miners get an average of $530 a month in pension checks.
A plan that would ensure the solvency of
the funds nearly made it through Congress in December as part of the bipartisan
budget deal that cleared both chambers. But the bailout attempt — backed by key
lawmakers from both political parties — was excluded from the deal at
McConnell’s request, according to four Senate officials directly familiar with
the events.
Without intervention, some of the funds
could run out of cash before spring, Congressional officials say.
Two years
ago, UMWA officials donated heavily to McConnell's political rival, Democrat Alison
Grimes, during McConnell’s successful reelection bid.
After World War II, with miners threatening
to strike, President Harry S. Truman ordered his secretary of the interior to
negotiate an agreement with the president of the union on pension and
healthcare benefits. Decades later, in 1992, Congress passed the Coal Act,
requiring companies to continue contributing to pension plans for all covered
retired employees.
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