May 5, 2025 - A presidential executive order could breathe new life into Kentucky’s coal mining industry.

Harlan, Kentucky, is a community built on the legacy of coal, but for decades, the industry has been more past than present. However, a signature from the president vows to rejuvenate America’s coal production.

Harlan County’s judge executive welcomed the support from the president’s recent order. Dan Mosley is the son of a coal miner and has been in county government for more than a decade. He’ll be the first to tell you, Harlan County has coal.

“There is still coal in these hills and there’s several mining operations that are still doing business today and employing people and have contracts to provide coal to power plants. There is still coal in the western Kentucky coal fields,” Mosley told Spectrum News.

The decline of coal production and loss of mining jobs has been well documented over the last 30 years.

“Of course, back years ago there was so much more mining taking place,” Mosley said. Mosley said Harlan County, alone, lost nearly 40% of its population since coal was in peak production. He’ll add, presidential policy played a role in pushing out an industry vital to eastern Kentucky. “This regulatory environment that coal has been in has perpetuated the loss of jobs, the loss of the use of the resource, itself, because it has been regulated out of business,” Mosley stated.

On April 8, President Donald Trump signed an executive order removing several Biden era policies, increasing American coal exports, and ensuring federal policy does not discriminate coal mining or coal-fired energy production.

“You’ve heard of people refer to the ‘War on Coal,’ and it was a war on coal, and we lost,” Mosley said.

Coal’s boom and bust cycles have been impacted by natural gas prices and technological advancements in coal extraction. Simply put, fewer people are needed in the process of coal mining than were required 30, 50 and 100 years ago.

Eastern Kentucky native Rainbo Johnson is a local expect in the coal industry. Johnson began his career in the mines and later owned his business. All in, Johnson spent nearly 50 years in the coal mining industry, riding all the ups and downs.

“When I was in business, I would run into people from Ireland and Scotland, visiting these coal companies to arrange some kind of market where they could buy our coal and our plants, our coal plants here in the United States were closing down simply because of overregulation,” Johnson said. 

Time will tell if President Trump’s executive order will, in fact, “turbo charge,” the industry. It has already fired up expectations where coal was once king.

“If coal companies are producing more coal, here, that means more people are working,” Judge Executive Mosley said.

Johnson added this, “There’s an excitement. There’s a new energy that we see in coal mining.”Time will tell if President Trump’s executive order will in fact, ‘turbo charge,’ the industry. It has already fired up expectations where coal was once king. “If coal companies are producing more coal, here, that means more people are working,” Judge Executive Dan Mosley said.

Rainbo Johnson adds this, “There’s an excitement. There’s a new energy that we see in coal mining.”