2018 primaries behind Alabama GOP's reaction to Moore allegations

While national Republicans have worked hard to distance themselves from Republican Senate nominee Roy Moore, state Republicans have met allegations that he engaged in sexual misconduct with teenagers in the late 1970s by staying put, or getting closer. 

The public reactions from Alabama GOP officials to the accusers range from silence to outrage over the reporting, with three Republican county chairs telling the Toronto Star they would still consider voting for Moore if the allegations were true.  

For the silent ones — who include House Speaker Mac McCutcheon, R-Monrovia and Senate President Pro Tem Del Marsh, R-Anniston — the reasons vary. Officials and political observers say they range from a desire to watch future developments in the story to fear of electoral consequences in next year’s primaries.

“In general, nobody wants to step up and get their head lopped off,” said David Mowery, a Montgomery political consultant who has worked on Democratic and Republican campaigns. “Whether it’s their electoral future or getting blasted in the media for the next month.”

Four women told the Washington Post last week that Moore, an assistant district attorney in Etowah County from 1977 to 1982, pursued relationships with them when they were teenagers. One, Leigh Corfman, said she was 14 when Moore, then 32, took her to his house one night in 1979, undressed her and guided her hand to the outside of his underpants. The legal age of consent in Alabama, then and now, is 16. The Post had 30 sources in its story corroborating the accounts.

On Monday, a fifth accuser, Beverly Nelson, said she was 16 when Moore offered her a ride home from a restaurant she worked at in 1977. Nelson said Moore sexually assaulted her, groping her and grabbed her by the neck in an attempt to pull her face to her crotch. 

In a story published on al.com Wednesday, a sixth woman, Tina Johnson, said Moore grabbed her rear end while she was visiting his law office on legal business in 1991. Johnson said Moore, who was married at the time, flirted with her and made her uncomfortable.  

Moore has called the allegations “completely false;” threatened to sue the Post and other media organizations reporting the allegations and said he did not know Corfman or Nelson. Speaking in Jackson in Clarke County Tuesday evening, Moore vowed to stay in the race. 

“After 40-something years of fighting this battle, I’m now facing allegations and that’s all the press wants to talk about, but I want to talk about the issue, I want to talk about where this country is going and if we don’t come back to God, we’re not going anywhere,” he said.

The women have stood by their accounts, and attorneys for both Nelson and Gloria Deason, who said Moore purchased wine for her when she was 18, below the legal drinking age at the time, say their clients are willing to testify under oath. 

Polls taken since the Post story published have shown the race tightening between Moore and Democratic nominee Doug Jones. The general election is Dec. 12. 

With a few exceptions, including Sen. Richard Shelby and the Greater Birmingham Young Republicans, Republican officials in Alabama who have spoken out on the allegations have been supportive of Moore. A GOP group in the fifth congressional district in north Alabama Tuesday urged the Alabama Republican Party to reaffirm its support for Moore. Noah Wahl, chairman of the Limestone County Republican Party, said in an interview Wednesday he supported Moore.

“We’re talking about a he-said-she-said,” he said. “I know not everyone agrees with him, but I believe he’s always proven himself to be trustworthy and honest.” 

The party reaffirmed its support for Moore on Thursday.

Privately, four state GOP legislators who spoke on background to speak freely expressed far more concern about the allegations than their colleagues have in public, with two citing Nelson’s public statement Monday as a major catalyst in their feelings.

“If this guy were a Democrat, would we be acting this way?” said one. “If Doug Jones was accused of this right here, we would demand his head on a pike.”

At the same time, others said there was little they could say that would sway Moore’s loyal base. 

“They are absolutely unwavering,” said one. “I think the only thing that could change his supporters’ minds is if we see a continuation of these complaints.”

Alabama Republican Party chair Terry Lathan Sunday warned that any Republican who endorsed Jones or a write-in candidate — an idea floated by national Republicans — could lose ballot access in future GOP primaries. Wahl said he would expect any Republican who spoke out against Moore to face consequences.

“If you have an elected Republican who comes out against a Republican nominee before an election, I think that would be damaging to the career of that person,” he said.

The chief fear is that Moore’s base would remember such an attack, and flock to an opponent ahead of next June’s primaries. It’s a fear Alabama consultants, both Democratic and Republican, consider rational for GOP officials. 

After a tape of then-Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump surfaced where he described grabbing women by their genitals in October 2016, U.S. Rep. Martha Roby, R-Montgomery, said she would not vote for Trump and stuck by her criticism even as her GOP colleagues ran away from their criticisms of Trump. Roby faced a write-in campaign from tea party activist Becky Gerritson, which severely cut Roby's margin of victory the following month. 

Few would want to face a similar scenario in next June's primary.

“There’s no doubt Roy Moore voters are the conservative base of the Republican Party,” said Lance Hyche, a Republican consultant. “When you look at those voters, they’re going to be the base for the 2018 elections.”

Hyche and Angi Horn Stalnaker, a Republican consultant, said some Republicans were staying quiet out of a policy of not getting involved in other people’s elections, but also because of an uncertainty about “what tomorrow will bring.”

“There is, without doubt, an undercurrent in Alabama, that whatever happens there is a large contingent of voters who always believe him,” Stalnaker said. “If you step out against Roy Moore, those voters will never forgive you.” 

Moore’s voters are not the entire GOP electorate, though, and Moore in the past has struggled in nonjudicial statewide elections. Despite leading some early polls, in 2006 he got just 33 percent of the vote in the GOP gubernatorial primary against incumbent Gov. Bob Riley. In 2010, facing six other opponents for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, Moore finished fourth, pulling in 19 percent of the vote. 

Moore won re-election as chief justice in 2012, but got just 52 percent of the vote in a year when Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney got 60 percent of the Alabama vote. 

“The idea that Moore is some sort of electoral juggernaut is not borne out by what we’ve seen in Alabama,” said Zac McCrary, a Democratic pollster with Anzalone Liszt Grove Research in Montgomery. “Every time Moore has tried to advance his career beyond the courts, he’s lost.”

Moore’s impact on other races is also harder to judge, in part because few individuals associated with Moore have run campaigns of their own, or explicitly invoked Moore in their races. Dean Young, a longtime Moore ally, ran against Bradley Byrne for the Mobile-area 1st Congressional District seat in 2013, advancing to a runoff and getting 47 percent of the vote. Byrne easily defeated Young in a primary for the seat in 2016. 

Still, there’s also a knowledge that Moore enjoys a loyal following that few politicians anywhere can match. 

“He’s got 50 percent of hardest core voters,” Mowery said. “I think they’re right to be worried.”