West Virginia has always been a heavily unionized and protectionist state. Sam reason why he won such a huge upset in Michigan, despite being behind by as much as 40 percent in some polls.
Gotta agree with Oldies Freak on this one....
Additionally, Bill Clinton barely lifted a finger to protect the Coal Miners and the UMWA during the '93 strike, at a time where the Coal Operators were trying to close down Union Mines and shift operations to Non-Union Mines elsewhere within the region and country.
West Virginia Democratic Primary voters have a long history of supporting candidates of religious minority background (JKF in '60, Bernie in '16) that actually spend some time in the state, and talk about the real bread and butter issues concerning the vast majority of the state.
Bernie talked a common sense language for those of us that were born and raised in rural and small Mill town communities....
Clinton '16 was a very different candidate from Clinton '08.... She spoke the language of suburban Democratic Voters in '16, and neglected the core Democratic values going back to the New Deal era, and instead tried to do a compare and contrast with Bernie, where she went after him on Guns of all things early in the Democratic Party Primary debates, and unlike even Dukakis in '88 I don't remember her once making a pitch for rural and small-town voters during the primaries or General Election....
then how did Bill easily win WV in 96 if he was so hated there.
