Trump ran for President as a populist candidate. Ostensibly, he was for the little man. The man without a voice. Again and again, during his rallies, he would shout out that he would speak for the people. That he cared about them and knew what they were going through. He didn’t care and he didn’t know. That was obvious to some of us then and it is obvious to all now.

No group was more enveloped by Trump’s patriarchy than coal miners. Trump has stated many times during the campaign and during his administration that he “loves coal miners”. He, and he alone, would stop this “war on coal”. Coal mining is an industry in this country in steep decline and the coal industry has been shedding jobs at an alarming rate for many decades. The reasons for this are many and complicated. Market forces such as the continuing reduction in prices of alternative energy sources such as natural gas and renewables, combined with technological advances in mining, and the public health issues associated with coal-fired power plant pollutants have relegated coal to the sidelines of any informed discussion of future energy sources. The die is cast with coal and there is no turning back.

Trump, however, doesn’t do complicated. He does simple. (He is simple.) To Trump, all that was needed to bring back coal was for him to shout it from the mountaintop and, of course, to get rid of regulations. Trump wasn’t in office for 5 months before he claimed, at one of his raucous rallies, that he had brought back “45,000 coal mining jobs”. Even for Trump, an outrageous claim. A reasonable analysis shows the increase in mining jobs during Trumps first 6 months in office to be about 1200 compared to 1100 during the 4 months from August through November 2016 of the Obama administration. For all of the bombast, no significant change.

Trump is affecting coal miners, though, but not in a good way. He picked David Zatezalo to head the Mine Health and Safety Administration (MHSA), the agency responsible for safety for all mining activities in the US. Zatezalo had previously served as president of Rhino Energy, a West Virginia mining company with a long history of safety violations, including 2 consecutive “pattern of violations” citations from the very agency he now heads. A “pattern of violations” is a rare sanction that is reserved for repeat offenders. Also, while he was running the company, Rhino was cited for illegally retaliating against a foreman who complained about sexual and ethnic harassment and unsafe conditions. This is definitely a man who should be running the nation’s mine safety agency.

Just last month, a notice in the Federal Register indicated that same agency responsible for the health and safety of miners, MHSA, is reconsidering regulations designed to protect miners from breathing coal dust (the cause of black lung) and diesel exhaust (linked to cancer). According to the notice, MHSA is seeking public comments on “requirements that could be streamlined or replaced in frequency” and making the regulation “less burdensome” for coal companies. The health of miners was not mentioned in the announcement. Mine owners across the country applauded the review. Keep in mind that this attempt at deregulation comes at a time when occupational health research shows a strong resurgence of black lung disease among younger miners (those who entered the mining labor force after 1969). TRUMP LOVES COAL MINERS.

One last point about Trump and coal. A few months ago, Trump was doing a photo op about coal mining and someone handed him a block of coal. So, he was standing there with this rather large lump of coal in his small hand and, of course, he had to talk. The man who has been touting the virtues of “clean coal” around the country had this to say, “They take this out of the ground and then, they . . well, they clean it, and then we use it . . .” The man is ignorant on so many fronts at once. For your information, there is no such thing as “clean coal”. It is an oxymoron. Coal is our dirtiest source of energy. Any attempt to “clean” coal results in other forms of pollution (such as millions of tons of coal ash) and still produces greenhouse gases.

Coal as a major source of energy in the world is disappearing. Trying to force coal back to some primacy in energy would be like trying to force the horse back into transportation primacy after the Model T. Society has moved on. We have better sources of energy – cleaner and less costly. Those industries, and those jobs, are our future and to remain competitive in the world markets, we need to look forward not back.

For coal workers, this country needs to speak to them, their families, and their communities honestly and frankly. No more outlandish promises. Workers in our fading industries, not just coal, need to be offered real training for viable, alternative careers. We don’t do that in this country. We talk about training, but no money and no training is ever made available. As a country, we cannot pile these people onto the scrap heap. Where are you Democrats?

The final assessment is that coal is going away. Now, how about Trump?