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For more than a year, Florida Gov. Rick Scott has engaged in a guessing game about his political future: Will he challenge U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson in 2018? President Donald Trump has already publicly called on Scott to run, but Scott again this week insisted he had not made up his mind. And he sidestepped questions about whether the upset win of Democrat Doug Jones in the neighboring state of Alabama is a sign that a GOP candidate could have difficulty next year in a state that has backed candidates of both parties.
President Donald Trump is not on the ballot in 2018, but the White House is planning a full-throttle campaign to plunge the president into the midterm elections, according to senior officials and advisers familiar with the planning. Trump's political aides have met with 116 candidates for office in recent months, according to senior White House officials, seeking to become involved in Senate, House and gubernatorial races - and possibly contested Republican primaries as well.
One lesson of the Alabama Senate race that does not seem to ever sink to either party is that there is no good reason for a president to name sitting office holders in critical positions to the Cabinet. I'm sure when Trump named Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III as Attorney General, Republicans thought there was absolutely no way they could possibly lose that seat.
As a scholar of African-American and Southern politics for the last 25 years, I've witnessed a lot of election upsets and surprises. None has been more interesting than the Democrat Doug Jones' election to the U.S. Senate in a Dec. 12 special election against Republican Roy Moore.
Alabama's election of a Democrat to the U.S. Senate for the first time in a quarter-century qualifies as historic but it does not indicate a sudden massive swing in voter allegiance in that state or nationwide.
Tuesday, Doug Jones became the first Democrat to win a U.S. Senate seat in Alabama since Richard Shelby in 1992. Jones defeated his Republican opponent, Roy Moore, in Alabama's special Senate election.
To Democrats, Senate candidate Doug Jones ' stunning victory in reliably Republican Alabama is more than a quirky one-off. Instead, party leaders cast the upset as a sign of growing nationwide momentum among voters opposed to President Donald Trump and an indication that Democrats shouldn't shy away from competing in Republican territory.
The first time ended badly, so when, 156 years later, Alabamians were incited to again try secession, this time from the national consensus that America is a pretty nice place, they said: No. No, that is, to rubbish like this: In April, Alabama's Republican governor, Robert Bentley, resigned one step ahead of impeachment proceedings arising from his consensual affair with an adult woman.
The prospect of a high-profile Republican senator dogged by sexual misconduct accusations had unnerved a GOP that's fearful of an albatross on its candidates in next year's campaigns. Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby says Moore would have brought a "radioactive" element to the Senate GOP.
U.S. Representative Bradley Byrne from Alabama's 1st Congressional District and his wife Rebecca Byrne talk to supporters after he was declared the winner of his congressional seat at his election party at Moe's Original BBQ in Mobile, Ala., on March 1, 2016. From left are his wife Rebecca Byrne, daughter Laura Byrne, his son Patrick Byrne holding grandson MacGuire Byrne, and daughter-in-law Carolyn Byrne.
Still-uncounted ballots are unlikely to change the outcome of the U.S. Senate race in Alabama enough to spur an automatic recount, the state's election chief said Wednesday as Democratic victor Doug Jones urged Republican Roy Moore to concede. Speaking during an afternoon news conference in Birmingham, Jones said a concession from Moore is the "right thing" to do, and that 'it's time to heal."
One consequence of the election results in Alabama is that the hostility between the establishment and the populist elements of the GOP coalition will rise to a new, potentially unsustainable level. Over the past 40 years, the Republican Party has largely become a coalition of two groups: white people for whom the economy and the U.S. political system work extremely well, and white people for whom the economy and our politics hardly work at all.
Alabama's surprising election outcome upended the expectations in both parties for next year's midterm campaigns, with Democrats emboldened by signs of a resurgent voter base and Republicans sensing new vulnerabilities. The victory Tuesday by Democrat Doug Jones to represent that heavily conservative state in the Senate was the latest example in a string of elections this year that Democratic leaders think represent a growing backlash against President Trump - and a potential building wave for 2018.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer asked Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to delay the vote on the tax bill until newly elected Senator-elect Doug Jones can cast a vote. Democrats warned Wednesday that Republican plans to speed ahead with revamping the nation's tax code could spell more electoral trouble for President Trump and his party next year, especially with young people and suburban families.
The easy, immediate and accurate analysis of Roy Moore's loss in Tuesday's election for the U.S. Senate is that the allegations made against him cost him the race. Without those allegations of sexual misconduct, which Moore repeatedly denied, he certainly would have sailed to victory.
Democratic Alabama U.S. Senate candidate Doug Jones pauses as he addresses supporters while wife Louise acknowledges the audience at the election night party in Birmingham, Alabama, Dec. 12, 2017. I don't want to rain on the winner's parade.
U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks said on the House floor this morning he has been diagnosed with "high-risk prostate cancer" and will have surgery on Friday. Brooks said he has "a very good cure prognosis."
In a stunning victory aided by scandal, Democrat Doug Jones won Alabama's special Senate election on Tuesday, beating back history, an embattled Republican opponent and President Donald Trump, who urgently endorsed GOP rebel Roy Moore despite a litany of sexual misconduct allegations. It was the first Democratic Senate victory in a quarter-century in Alabama, one of the reddest of red states, and proved anew that party loyalty is anything but sure in the age of Trump.
Democrat Doug Jones celebrates his Election Night victory on Tuesday, Dec. 12, 2017, at the Sheraton Hotel in Birmingham. (Joe Songer When Doug Jones is sworn in as Alabama's newest senator, he will arrive to Washington, D.C. as a "darling" of national Democrats.