West Virginia Sen. Jim Justice to Pay Millions After DOJ Sues Over Long-Unpaid Taxes

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Jim Justice to pay more than $5M in back taxes

By Gregory Svirnovskiy

Republican Sen. Jim Justice and his wife have agreed to pay more than $5 million in back taxes dating back over 15 years, as the freshman senator continues to weather financial difficulties that marred his time in the West Virginia governor’s office.

The settlement was disclosed just hours after the Department of Justice sued to collect the taxes Monday.

Justice, a coal magnate who served eight years as West Virginia’s governor before his 2024 election to replace Democrat-turned-independent Joe Manchin in the Senate, has long been dogged by reports of financial troubles.

Once dubbed the only billionaire in West Virginia, Justice’s fortunes took a hit as coal lost its preeminence in the American energy scene. Things got so bad in 2023 that he reportedly faced a potential garnishment of his governor’s salary to pay down loans for coal equipment.

In October, POLITICO reported that the Internal Revenue Service had filed a notice of a federal tax lien against Justice, listing him and his wife with over $8 million in unpaid assessments.

Justice’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But the senator has taken an optimistic tone in the past.

“I think the bottom line, the whole thing is we have a dispute,” he said of the IRS lien in October. “I think they owe me a whole lot more money than I owe them.”

And he has continued to live in luxury, spending the first several months of his Senate term commuting to Washington daily on a private jet as he scouted homes in the area.