On Tuesday, RedState reported how Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) had been hit with a fresh wave of bad news, with the most recent polling on the hotly anticipated 2024 Senate race there showing Republican Gov. Jim Justice, who in April officially declared his candidacy, with a staggering 22 percent lead over Manchin.

The numbers matched up with other polls taken in the last year or so regarding a potential Manchin/Justice match-up, and the new poll also noted that Manchin’s not doing so great among the state’s Democrats, with “barely half (51%) of self-identified Democrats in West Virginia [approving] of Senator Manchin’s job performance.”

With all of that in mind, it makes sense that Republicans would question the timing of news that broke Wednesday on how Joe Biden’s Dept. of Justice, led by partisan actor Merrick Garland, was taking aim at Justice’s considerable coal empire, which is currently headed by his son, Jim Justice III:

The Justice Department (DOJ) on Wednesday filed a civil complaint against Jim Justice III, the son of West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice (R), a 2024 Senate candidate, and 13 coal companies he owns, alleging unpaid fines for earlier mining violations.

The complaint claims Jim Justice III-owned firms committed more than 130 violations of federal mining law between 2018 and 2022 and ignored more than 50 warnings from the government to halt operations until they had been resolved. The alleged violations also accrued $7.6 million in unpaid fees and interest, according to the filing.

“Our environmental laws serve to protect communities against adverse effects of industrial activities including surface coal mining operations,” said Todd Kim, assistant attorney general of the DOJ’s Environment and Natural Resources Division, in a statement. “Through this suit, the Justice Department seeks to deliver accountability for defendants’ repeated violations of the law and to recover the penalties they owe as a result of those violations.”

The full 128 complaint can be viewed here.

The NRSC blasted the DOJ in a statement, alleging that “Joe Biden’s Department of Justice has gone totally rogue.”

“Democrats weaponizing the federal government to attack the family of a Republican Senate candidate is a complete abuse of power,” NRSC spokesman Tate Mitchell wrote.

Justice, too, pointed to the suspicious timing of the DOJ’s announcement:

“I’ve announced as a Republican that I’m running for the U.S. Senate. The Biden administration is aware of the fact that with a win for the U.S. Senate and everything, we could very well flip the Senate,” Justice said. “There’s a lot at stake right now.”

Later Wednesday, Justice’s Senate campaign doubled-down on criticism of the lawsuit’s timing.

“Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer, and the Democrats have seen the polls that show Jim Justice winning this race, and they’re panicking,” Roman Stauffer, Justice’s campaign manager, said in a statement. “So now the Biden Justice Department has decided to play politics. We will see a lot more of this as the Democrats work to help Alex Mooney because they know they can easily beat him.”

This may be a legit suit/complaint, as from what I’ve read there have been legal wranglings over this issue going back several years. I just don’t know.

But considering how the DOJ has been repeatedly weaponized under Attorney General Merrick Garland’s “leadership,” including the despicable targeting of concerned parents over what their children are being taught, absolutely no one should be surprised if at some point in the near future we get receipts that definitively proove it was deliberately launched at a time when Manchin is in trouble with voters back home and Biden is desperate to get back in his good graces.

As always, buckle up – and stay tuned.

Flashback: Stage Being Set for a Mighty Fall for Joe Manchin