Two women have come forward in recent weeks to say that Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore sexually assaulted them when they were teenagers. The women’s accounts are specific and appear to be credible; they’re more generally supported by reporting that indicates that, as a thirtysomething, Moore had a reputation in his hometown for bothering teenage girls at a local mall. (Moore has denied the accusations and said they have been fabricated as part of a liberal media conspiracy.) In the wake of the allegations, four polls found that Moore’s Democratic opponent Doug Jones was leading their race—a shocking outcome in Alabama, which hasn’t elected a Democrat to the Senate in decades.
But that’s over now, as RealClearPolitics’ aggregation of the race’s most recent polls indicates:
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FiveThirtyEight notes that Alabamans’ Google search interest in Moore dropped off a week after the first allegation against him was published, which is about the same time his polling recovered.
In related news, Republican Rep. Mo Brooks—one of Moore’s former primary opponents—asserted Tuesday that one of Moore’s accusers must have “forged” a note that she says the candidate left in her high school yearbook in 1977. Brooks added that the “mainstream leftwing socialist Democrat news media” is engaging in a concerted effort to defeat Moore.
Nice to see former rivals finding common cause!
