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Gerth: N.J. congressional candidate isn’t saving KY coal | Opinion

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Gerth: N.J. congressional candidate isn’t saving KY coal | Opinion



Eastern Kentucky has a long history of being taken advantage by outsiders who came to the state and cut the old-growth trees and tore up the land extracting coal from the ground.

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  • A New Jersey congressional candidate’s website listed reopening Kentucky coal mines as a top priority.
  • The candidate, Gregg Mele, claimed his website was either hacked or contained an error.
  • Restarting the coal industry in Eastern Kentucky is unlikely due to depleted coal seams and cheap natural gas.

Something seemed amiss when a friend in Washington, D.C. sent me an email about a candidate in New Jersey who seemed to be taking an oversized interest in what happens in Eastern Kentucky.

Gregg Mele, a perennial candidate who somehow became the Republican nominee in New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District in this year’s election, seemed from his campaign website to be auditioning to replace 88-year-old Hal Rogers of Kentucky and not 81-year-old Bonnie Watson Coleman of the Garden State.

Mele was pledging on his campaign website to “reopen and open new coal mines in Kentucky’s 5th District” and to “Access untapped oil in Southeastern Kentucky.”

It seemed oddly specific.

Why Kentucky’s 5th District and not West Virginia’s 1st or Pennsylvania’s 14th?

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It’s even odder when you look at the campaign websites of Rogers, who has represented Kentucky’s 5th District since 1981, and Democrat Ned Pillersdorf, who is running to replace him, and neither say anything about bringing coal back.

The last mention of coal on Rogers’ website is a 2013 press release where he talks about diversifying the region’s economy beyond coal.

KY coal issues at top of website

Not only did Mele include these two items in the section of his website listing his platform, they were the top two issues.

To be honest, I wasn’t quite sure what to think of this.

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Eastern Kentucky has a long history of being taken advantage of by outsiders who came to the state and cut the old-growth trees and tore up the land while extracting coal from the ground.

They took our natural resources worth billions of dollars and left behind only poverty and scarred mountains.

Was Mele seeking to restart this type of neocolonialism, or was he actually trying to help by somehow providing jobs in an industry that is increasingly becoming automated?

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Could hackers be responsible?

So, I asked him.

“I’m sorry, this seems to be an error or a hack. I am getting my team on this to have it corrected,” he said in an email.

That was on Wednesday. It was still on the website on Thursday.

I’m betting on an error.

It doesn’t seem much like something a hacker would add to a website.

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Either way, it’s probably not a big deal as Mele’s chances of winning in the Democratic district are practically non-existent. Polymarket gives him just an 8% chance of winning, and I can’t find a single organization that rates House races that believes the district is in play.

No matter how many House members from Kentucky or West Virginia or Pennsylvania or even New Jersey want to jump start the coal industry in Kentucky, it’s unlikely to happen. Especially in Eastern Kentucky where the large coal seams have been depleted by more than a century of mining.

Coal industry peaked in KY

The rise of fracking, which has made natural gas cheap and easily attainable, may have been the death knell.

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The coal industry peaked in Kentucky after World War II, when nearly 80,000 Kentuckians worked in the coal industry, and it has been falling ever since particularly over the last 40 years.

In 1990, more than 28,000 people were employed in Kentucky’s coal industry, according to the Kentucky Center for Statistics. By 2023, the number had dropped to 3,939, and the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis estimates the number of coal mining jobs in Kentucky fell to 2,900 last year.

And Mele, despite what his website says, ain’t going to stop that trend.

Joseph Gerth can be reached at 502-582-4702 or by email at jgerth@courierjournal.com. You can also follow him at @jgerth.bsky.social.



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New Jersey

Ex-NJ GOP aide accused of staging slashing attack shows off horrific scars — and mystery man — in new snap

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Ex-NJ GOP aide accused of staging slashing attack shows off horrific scars — and mystery man — in new snap


The unhinged ex-GOP aide who claimed she had been viciously attacked and labeled “Trump whore” — but who authorities say staged the assault and hired a fetish artist to carve her up — showed off her jaw-dropping scars in a new photo, along with a heavily-tattooed mystery man. 

Natalie Greene, the Ocean City, NJ woman accused of faking a gruesome politically-driven assault while working for Republican Rep. Jeff Van Drew, shared a glimpse into her life for the first time since the scandal broke nearly a year ago.

The 26-year-old updated her Facebook profile picture on the Fourth of July to a smiling selfie of herself and the new pal.

Natalie Greene updated her Facebook profile photo on July 4. FaceBook / Natalie Greene

She wore a knitted tank top – exposing multiple thick, pink scars across her shoulder, chest and neck. 

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Her dark hair was slicked back into a low ponytail, and her manicured hand covered her mouth as she laughed. 

A man wearing sunglasses and a baseball cap with tattoos up his neck and arm smiled next to her. 

Greene, a Masarati-driving ex-Rutgers Law student, was charged with conspiracy to falsely report a violent attack and giving false statements to law enforcement after claiming she was repeatedly slashed by three masked gunmen in a local park because she worked for Van Drew, a pol who had switched from Democrat to Republican in 2020.

Greene was found after the allegedly staged attack with “Trump whore” written on her stomach. U.S. Attorney’s Office

Authorities found Greene on the ground with her hands and ankles zip-tied on a trail at a nature preserve in Egg Harbor Township on the night of July 23, 2025. She had dozens of bloody surgical-like slashes across her back, shoulder, chest and face. The words “Trump whore” were written across her stomach in black marker. 

But the attack was nothing but a hoax, according to the Department of Justice, which said Greene hired a Pennsylvania-based “scarification” fetish artist to cut her up. Detectives even discovered a reference photo that Greene showed the artist – and her cuts matched the image exactly, investigators said. 

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Greene had her arms and ankles zip tied when she was found. U.S. Attorney’s Office

Greene was granted supervised release in January as she awaits trial.

Childhood campmate Kristin Haughton James —  who was previously busted for cocaine possession and riding an unlicensed vehicle in the streets, a Camden court heard in January — welcomed her into her Florida home and has been acting as her custodian. 

Before moving in with Haughton James, Greene had already cycled through two other guardians – including her mother – and had been ordered to attend inpatient treatment. 

Greene was a law student when the scandal broke out. Instagram / Natalie Greene

But the arraignment quickly descended into a nightmare, Haughton James revealed. 

“I have never met chaos incarnate until I met this person,” she told NJ.com. “Lives for the drama – wants everything to be about her.

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“She just feeds off attention.”

She claimed Greene left her home a wreck, tried to get her evicted and falsely told cops that she was dealing drugs and threatened her with a gun. 

Haughton James said she kicked her out in March. It is unclear where Greene is currently living.

Haughton James, Greene and Greene’s attorney did not return messages seeking comment.

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New Jersey

Husband of slain New Jersey mom begs for help in newly released 911 call | Fox News Video

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Husband of slain New Jersey mom begs for help in newly released 911 call | Fox News Video


Former homicide detective Brian Foley provides expert insights into the newly released 911 call from Conor Hanlon, whose wife, New Jersey therapist Brooke Hanlon, was found stabbed to death. Foley analyzes the husband’s emotional state and the police’s approach, noting the case’s ‘suspicious’ designation 13 minutes into the call.



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New Jersey

NJ firefighter dies after crash responding to fire call

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NJ firefighter dies after crash responding to fire call


A young firefighter died two weeks after being badly hurt in a crash while responding to a fire call, according to the Malaga Fire Company.

Robert (Bobby) Reider, 23, was driving north along Delsea Drive while trying to get to the scene of fire on Saturday, June 27 when his car went off the road, officials said.

When first responders got to the scene of the crash, they found Reider trapped in his car and worked to remove him.

Reider was then taken by helicopter to a nearby hospital where he was treated for severe and traumatic injuries.

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Weeks later, on July 10 around 4:30 a.m., Reider died from his injuries while still in the hospital.

The Malaga Fire Company says that Reider joined their team in 2018 when he was just 16 as a junior firefighter.

He then went on to earn a certificate at Fire 1 at the Salem County Fire Academy in 2022.



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