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Governor Jim Justice is trying to prevent foreclosure on his West Virginia hotel while running for U.S. Senate

CHARLESTON, West Virginia – Governor Jim Justice, as part of his run for U.S. Senate, is engaged in a bitter legal battle over the preservation of a historic West Virginia hotel at his luxury resort before it is auctioned off next week over unpaid debts.

About 400 employees at The Greenbrier hotel received a letter on Monday from an attorney for health insurer Amalgamated National Health Fund informing them that they would lose their insurance coverage starting Aug. 27 if the Republican’s family did not pay the $2.4 million in missing premiums, Peter Bostic of the Workers United Mid-Atlantic Regional Joint Board said Tuesday.

Coverage would end on the day the hotel is scheduled to be auctioned. Attorneys for the Justice family have asked a judge to stop that, arguing, among other things, that the auction would hurt the economy and put hundreds of jobs at risk.

The Justice family has not paid any contributions to its employees’ health insurance plan for four months, and according to the letter from Ronald Richman, an attorney with the Schulte Roth law firm, $1.2 million in additional contributions will soon be due. and Zabel LLP, the law firm representing the Amalgamated National Health Fund.

The letter also stated that some contributions had been deducted from employees’ salaries but never transferred to the health insurance fund, which worried union officials.

“We are deeply saddened and disappointed that the Greenbrier Hotel has fallen significantly behind on payments despite its contractual and legal obligation to our health insurance provider,” Bostic said in a statement. “The Greenbrier’s delinquency has seriously jeopardized our members’ health insurance benefits and is morally and legally wrong.”

The letter was first reported on RealWV, a news site owned by former Democratic Senator Stephen Baldwin. Democrat Glenn Elliott, Justice’s opponent in the U.S. Senate race and former mayor of Wheeling, wrote on the social media platform X that Justice’s “sense of entitlement to things that are not his is limitless and untenable.”

Justice, who owns dozens of companies and whose net worth was estimated by Forbes magazine at $513 million in 2021, has been accused in numerous lawsuits of being millions in arrears on family business debts and fines for unsafe working conditions at its coal mines.

He began his first of two terms as governor in 2017 after purchasing the Greenbrier out of bankruptcy in 2009. The hotel has hosted U.S. presidents, royals and hosted a PGA Tour tournament from 2010 to 2019.

Justice’s family also owns the Greenbrier Sporting Club, a private luxury community with a members-only “resort within a resort.” That property was scheduled to be auctioned this year, which was an attempt by Carter Bank. and Trust, based in Martinsville, Virginia, is trying to recover more than $300 million in business loans that the governor’s family defaulted on, but a legal battle has delayed that process.

The auction, which is scheduled for a courthouse in the small town of Lewisburg, is for 60.5 acres – including a hotel and parking lot.

The hotel was at risk of auction after JPMorgan Chase sold a long-standing loan from Justice to debt collection agency McCormick 101, which declared the company insolvent.

In court documents filed this week, Justice Department lawyers said a 2014 trust deed approved by the governor was defective because JPMorgan did not obtain consent from the Greenbrier Hotel Corporation’s directors or owners, and that the auction of the property violated the company’s obligation to act “in good faith and fairly” toward the corporation.

Neither the Justice family’s lawyers nor Adam Long, Greenbrier’s CFO and treasurer, responded to requests for comment Tuesday.

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This story has been corrected to show that approximately 400 employees received the insurance letter, not exactly 400.

By Bronte

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