CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) – West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice signed a number of socially conservative laws during his two terms in office. But he rarely pressed for it.
The Democrat-turned-Republican, now entering the U.S. Senate to fill former independent U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin’s seat, instead promoted tax cuts and economic development and approved measures such as the state’s abortion ban starting in 2022 without much public fanfare.
West Virginia has been a conservative stronghold for more than a decade, but it could see an even further rightward shift on social policy as one GOP governor replaces another.
In stark contrast is Patrick Morrisey, who will be sworn in as the justice’s successor on Monday. As attorney general since 2013, when he became the first Republican to hold the job in 80 years, Morrisey has emphasized his dogged defense not only of abortion restrictions but also of laws that would establish a school voucher-like savings account program and ban transgender athletes from participating in sports.
Morrisey is likely to take a more hands-on approach to the state Legislature than to the judiciary, who has sometimes been accused of being an absentee governor because of his lack of presence at the state Capitol.
During a press conference earlier this month, Morrisey said he plans to “immediately remove all traces of DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) from state government” and continue efforts to “eradicate woke.”
“The politically correct agenda that we have seen from the left over the years has no place in West Virginia,” he said.
During his time in office, Justice occasionally expressed frustration that the GOP-controlled Legislature was too extreme, including when he vetoed a bill last year to curb mandatory vaccinations for non-traditional public school students. In contrast, Morrisey said in a gubernatorial debate last year that he would support adding a religious exemption to West Virginia’s vaccination requirements. The state does not currently allow non-medical exemptions.
Mike Pushkin, chairman of the state Democratic Party, said he believes Morrisey’s political philosophy is very different from Justice’s.
“I think he is more of an ideologue – he is a true believer,” Pushkin said. “And so you’re more likely to see a very aggressive conservative agenda.”
Morrisey takes the helm as West Virginia Republicans have secured one of the largest legislative supermajorities in the country, controlling 123 of 134 seats, as well as all of the state’s public works department and congressional seats. Justice lost a seat in the U.S. Senate after Manchin decided not to seek re-election, easily defeating a Manchin-backed Democrat.
State GOP Party Chairman Matt Herridge described West Virginia as the “most dominant Republican state in the nation” and a blueprint for the national party.
“What the people of West Virginia have given the Republican Party, I think, is a mandate to continue to advance conservative values: less government, more individual autonomy, less state autonomy,” he said.
He described Morrisey as a unifying force for a “new Republican Party” with a more populist, working-class orientation where there is room for disagreement, adding that the judiciary also fits that mold.
Democrats have long governed the state with a robust union presence and identity as the party of working people, and as recently as 2008 had a supermajority in both chambers. But in the 2014 general election, voters in the coal-dependent state turned their antipathy toward Democratic President Barack Obama’s efforts to cut carbon emissions from coal-fired power plants.
Obama was so unpopular in West Virginia that a federal inmate in Texas received 41% of the vote in the 2012 Democratic presidential primary.
After the 2014 election, Republicans took control of both legislative chambers. West Virginia and Oklahoma were the only states where voters in every county voted to elect Donald Trump as president in 2016, 2020 and 2024. Trump won West Virginia in 2024 with 70% of the vote, which was the highest percentage in the country.
During a lawmaker’s farewell speech last week, Justice touted successes in reducing the state’s personal income and other taxes, as well as boosting tourism revenue and infrastructure programs. Towards the end of his remarks he also touched on the issue of abortion.
“We’ve been rock solid for life, haven’t we?” he said. “And anyone from the outside who would wonder about West Virginia should know better – we are unwavering in our support of West Virginia life.”
Justice, a girls basketball coach, said he “proudly” signed the 2021 law banning transgender athletes from competing in the state, but has not advocated for it as vocally as Morrisey, who has repeated it in court as attorney general defended.
“We will not allow swamp elites to impose their values on the citizens of West Virginia,” Morrisey said last year when he announced he would take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Morrisey also announced last summer his intention to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review rulings that found the state’s refusal to cover certain health services for transgender people through government-sponsored insurance to be discriminatory.
