In the blood-red state of Alabama, a fiery, outspoken jurist is running for U.S. Senate by standing up for what he believes.
Former Alabama Chief Justice Roy
Moore doesn’t shrink from telling voters he has twice been ousted from
the bench for defying federal courts over the Ten Commandments and
same-sex marriage.
Instead, he wears those rejections as a badge of honor, telling Republican voters that they are akin to battle scars.
“I will not only say what is right, I will do what is right,” Moore said during a June forum in the east Alabama city of Oxford.
Moore is part of a crowded GOP field vying to fill
Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ old seat in the U.S. Senate. Moore’s
iconic status in the culture wars gives him a strong GOP voter base and
makes him a leading contender in the primary on August 15.
But he’s also a polarizing figure. Some voters said they are voting for him because of his past fights.
Others said they want someone else for the same
reasons. Southern Poverty Law Center President Richard Cohen, who filed
the complaint that led to Moore’s removal, last year referred to him as
the “Ayatollah of Alabama” for intertwining his personal religious
beliefs and judicial responsibilities.
Incumbent Sen. Luther Strange, appointed last year by
the state’s former governor and backed by Republican establishment,
faces multiple challengers. Among them, in addition to Moore, is U.S.
Rep. Mo Brooks, a member of the House Freedom Caucus who has the
endorsement of Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham. The race could lead to a
runoff between the top two primary finishers.
The Senate Leadership Fund, which has ties to Senate
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and tries to bank candidates perceived
as winnable in general elections, has put its fiscal force behind
Strange.
The Republican National Committee last week
authorized its Senate campaign arm, the National Republican Senatorial
Committee, to spend $350,000 on the Alabama Senate race, money that is
expected to benefit Strange.
Moore is a West Point graduate and former military
policeman during Vietnam. He became a prosecutor, circuit judge and then
state chief justice.
But Alabama’s judicial discipline panel twice
stripped him of his chief justice duties. In 2003 he was removed for
disobeying a federal judge’s order to remove a boulder-sized Ten
Commandments monument from the state courthouse.
He re-took the chief justice’s office in 2012, but was suspended for the remainder of his term last year.
The suspension — not, technically, a removal — came
after Moore wrote a memo telling probate judges that they remained under
a state court order to deny marriage licenses to gay couples even
though the U.S. Supreme Court ruled gays and lesbians have a fundamental
right to marry. While he was suspended, Moore left the bench to run for
Senate.
“I stood up to same-sex marriage legally by pointing
out active injunctions. They didn’t like that. I opposed the agenda of
the Supreme Court, and they came after me,” Moore said in Oxford.
Thirty-nine-year-old Emily Holland said she admires
Moore. “He goes by what the Bible says,” said Holland. “He has been to
war. He refused to take down the Ten Commandments.”
Jean Hobson said she watched the Oxford debate to
learn more about the other candidates, but knows she’s not voting for
Strange or Moore.
“Judge Moore has been elected twice and thrown out twice,” Hobson said.
Moore also discusses other issues on the campaign
trail — including a call for increased military spending — but it’s his
well-known history that appears to be driving both his support and his
opposition.
For now, “The Judge,” as Moore is nicknamed, revels in his outsider status in a year of anti-Washington sentiment.
“Washington doesn’t want me, evidently, from the
money they are pouring behind one of the candidates and from the message
we received from Washington. That’s OK,” Moore said with a slight grin
as he removed his sunglasses during a sweltering June campaign stop on
the Alabama Capitol steps. “I’m looking forward to going and
representing the people of Alabama, what they stand for. What they
believe in is what I believe in and I’ll take it to Washington whether
they like it or they don’t.”