Coal company owned by Sen. Jim Justice releases financial statement contradicting its previous sworn testimony

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 12, 2026

CONTACT
Dan Radmacher, Media Specialist, (276) 289-1018, dan@appvoices.org

ABINGDON, Va. — A recent financial disclosure by A&G Coal Company asserts that the company has substantial positive net assets, contradicting the recent sworn testimony of its general counsel asserting that it was over $9 million in debt and therefore unable to comply with its obligations under a court-approved 2023 settlement agreement. 

Attorneys representing a coalition of conservation organizations filed a motion in federal court today alerting the court to A&G’s audited financial disclosure showing that, in fact, it has net assets of over $9 million, investment assets exceeding $30 million and operational revenue of more than $27 million. 

A&G is majority-owned by Sen. Jim Justice, R-W.Va., and managed by his son, Jay Justice. The family’s coal business, which spans multiple states and numerous mining companies, has been embroiled in litigation and controversy for many years due to violations of workplace safety and environmental standards, and failures to pay its debts.

Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards, along with Appalachian Voices and the Virginia chapter of the Sierra Club, sued A&G Coal in January 2023 over a decade-long pattern of non-compliance and failure to reclaim three of the company’s mountaintop removal mines in Wise County, Va., where SAMS is based. That lawsuit led to a settlement with A&G requiring the company to meet reclamation deadlines, prohibiting further extraction of coal if those deadlines were missed and stipulating that A&G must pay financial penalties to a local watershed organization for its failure to clean up the mines in a proper and timely manner.

A&G failed to comply with the terms of the settlement in numerous ways, prompting the conservation groups to ask the court to hold the company in contempt in October 2024. During a hearing on this contempt motion, Stephen Ball claimed under oath that the company was tens of millions of dollars in debt. 

But on Jan. 14, A&G provided an audited financial statement, prepared by Roanoke, Virginia, accounting firm Hamlet PCA Services, to the Virginia Department of Energy to verify that the company meets the legal requirement that it have a minimum net worth of $1 million in order to hold self-bonds for its coal mines. 

Mining companies must post a reclamation bond in order to operate a coal mine. A reclamation bond is a financial instrument that regulators can use to conduct environmental cleanup if the coal company loses its mining permit or goes bankrupt. Reclamation bonds are usually in the form of collateral or sureties — a sort of insurance policy. But A&G’s mines are self-bonded, meaning the company was not required to provide a typical bond and was instead allowed to mine coal in Virginia with the understanding that A&G’s own assets could be seized by the state for environmental cleanup if necessary. A&G’s mines were grandfathered in when self-bonds were outlawed in Virginia in 2014. 

“The integrity of the judicial process depends on honest testimony,” said Matt Hepler, Environmental Scientist for Appalachian Voices. “When a company presents itself as deeply in debt in court, but submits audited records showing millions in assets to state regulators, the contradiction demands scrutiny.”

Attorneys with Appalachian Mountain Advocates are representing Southern Appalachian Mountain Stewards, Appalachian Voices and the Sierra Club in this matter.