Alabama U.S. Senate- Race of the Day

99 Days Until Election Day

Alabama U.S. Senate

Status: Republican Open

2020 Presidential Result: Red State (South)

Outlook: Safe Republican

Alabama is a deeply Republican state and has been a theme in many Republican primaries across the country, Donald Trump has cast a huge shadow on determining whom the Republican nominee, and likely next Senator from the Yellowhammer State will be. This is not to say that is likely the result would might not have turned out the same had he stayed out of it.

Trump held his first Presidential rally in Alabama a few years back and it is a state that he did very well in. Still, he had to witness the embarrassment of the party temporarily losing a Senate seat due to a monumentally flawed Senate candidate that the then President had endorsed. This was after the interim incumbent, whom Trump had endorsed in the primary, had lost himself. That race was tied up in the drama of Trump having picked Senator Jeff Sessions as his first Attorney General and then turning on him in a very personal and public matter.

Republican Richard Shelby is retiring from office after six terms and at the age of 88. He had first gone to Capitol Hill after the 1978 elections as a conservative Democrat Congressman during a time when many existed in his state and throughout the south. In 1986, Shelby moved up to the Senate, defeating a Republican incumbent. It was only the day after the huge 1994 midterm which gave control of the Senate to Republicans that the Senator formally switched parties. During this time, Shelby has fit in as a conservative on most issues and as a civil pragmatist within the institution.

Once Shelby announced his retirement, there was little doubt that the seat would ultimate go Republican. Recent Senator Doug Jones, fresh off a landslide defeat in 2020 had no interest in running and the party bench for Democrats, save for the one heavily African-American Congressional district in the state was by now virtually non-existent.

The nominee for Shelby's one time party is Will Boyd, an African-American and a pastor and former City Councilman in Downstate Illinois, who had run for several political offices. Boyd won the lightly noticed May primary with 67 percent of the vote over two other black Democrats.

Boyd will now face Republican Katie Britt, whose maiden name happens to be Boyd, though it is unlikely the two general election candidates are related.

The GOP nominee would have a longer and more complex path to the nomination. At just 40 years old, Britt is poised to be the first ever woman that Alabama will elect to the Senate and perhaps the youngest female Senator in American history. In a state where Congressional seniority is important, she might be around Washington D.C. for a very long time. She is sharing the GOP ticket with the state's soon to be 78 year old female incumbent Governor.

 

Even before he announced his retirement, Shelby was hoping Britt would succeed him. She first began working for the Senator in 2004, and after leaving to embark on a law career, she returned to Capitol Hill for a stint as Shelby's Chief of Staff. Later, Britt became the first woman to head the Business Council of Alabama.

While Britt had the support of a powerful benefactor and many in the state's political establishment, there were of course other Alabama Republicans who wanted the opportunity to run for an open Senate seat, and who had greater name recognition by virtue of having won previous offices. Most of them though would ultimately decide it would be too hard to raise the necessary money against Britt and stood aside. Some lesser known candidates entered the race and some exited before the primary as well.

The one opponent who was undeterred was Mo Brooks, who was first elected to Congress in 2010, and who had become a somewhat nationally prominent member of the staunchly conservative Freedom Caucus. He had run in the doomed 2017 special Senate election for Republicans, finishing third, but which did not necessitate him having to give up his House seat. Brooks continued to be outspoken on behalf of Trump and was among those in the U.S. House who pushed the hardest to try to overthrow the results of the election. Famously, Brooks took the stage at the January 6 pre-riot rally and said that it would be the day that American patriots would "kick ass and take names."

This sort of rhetoric and loyalty to the former President was all Donald Trump would need to offer Brooks his "complete and total endorsement" and some polling indicated that with all the pull Trump had in Alabama, it was very possible that Brooks would defeat Britt and move on to the Senate. Trump would even weigh in accusing Britt of being unqualified for the Senate amid talk that he and Senator Shelby did not have a great relationship.

Some in the Alabama GOP had great qualms about the prospect of nominating and electing Brooks. Then in August of last year, Brooks went up before a pro-Trump audience and was surprised to be booed after telling the crowd that everyone needed to move from whatever theft had happened in 2020 and focus on 2022 and 2024. Brooks would soon learn that loyalty is a very fickle concept to Trump and that the former President has no use for anyone who wants to move on from grievances over 2020. Trump started to threaten online to withdraw support from Brooks and the candidate's standing in the polls began to stumble. 

By this time, a third major candidate had emerged in businessman Michael Durant, a first time candidate who had received national attention as an Army pilot in 1993 when he was involved in and survived the infamous "Black Hawk Down" incident in Somalia. After leaving the military, the New Hampshire native moved to Alabama where he would also work as an author and motivational speaker. He developed some ties to the GOP political establishment in the state but as a Senate candidate ran as a Trump supporting outsider. As Durant's support rose in the polls, supporters of perhaps both Brooks and Britt tried to accuse Durant of being a secret Never Trumper and a stealth Mitch McConnell backed candidate in the race. Common sense would seem to indicate though that Senate GOP Leader McConnell would have been going along with Shelby's desire to root for Britt.

Ultimately, Trump blisteringly accused Brooks of "going woke" over the 2020 election and formally withdrew his endorsement. This was done after it was clear that Brooks was unlikely to win a runoff and might not even get to that point. Trump wanted to back a winner and was said to be leaning towards an endorsement of Britt, the one-time clear establishment choice. In particular, Trump, who has affection for football players was impressed that Katie was married to Wesley Britt, an Offensive Tackle, who had starred for the Crimson Tide, who would go on to play sparingly for the New England Patriots during a brief NFL career. Britt had featured her much taller and larger husband in her political ads in which he bragged that his wife was the toughest person he had ever met. The candidate Britt tried her best not to go too far in embracing Trumpian rhetoric but made it clear she would welcome his endorsement.

With his political life on the line, Brooks felt he had no other option but to try to convince voters he was still the only MAGA candidate in the race and via appearances on Fox News and other outlets, he tried to once again fight the battle claiming that fraud had decided the 2020 election, not "looking forward" as he once said was needed, but seemingly trying to get back in Trump's good graces and maybe win back the endorsement.

Brooks still had the support of Texas Senator Ted Cruz and other movement conservatives and managed to make the runoff, though Britt's lead of 45-29 made it clear she would be tough to stop in a runoff the following month. Durant finished in third with 23 percent, accused his opponents of dirty tricks and said he would not endorse anyone, though he seemed especially aggrieved at Britt.

After the primary, Trump formally endorsed Britt, the candidate he once said was unqualified for the job, but who seemed destined to win the nomination. Brooks accused Trump of being "conned" by Mitch McConnell and others and blasted his one time political sponsor for disloyalty. He would all but accuse Trump of asking him to engage in illegal activities in the attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

 

One very interesting aspect to all of this is that for all the dislike Trump projects onto McConnell, he did "the old crow", a tremendous favor by turning on Brooks, who had promised to vote against McConnell for Leader and would have been a huge headache as a member as a Senator.

Britt easily took the runoff 63-37 and Brooks faced the prospect of leaving Congress and according to some potentially facing criminal consequences for his role on January 6, 2022. Trump had endorsed the winner though when all was said and done and Katie Britt is likely to have little difficulty beating a virtually unknown Democrat in ruby red Alabama during this midterm election.

On runoff night though, Brooks spoke before supporters at a gun range and delivered one of the most bitter concession speeches in recent memory (but at least he conceded.) He congratulated Alabama Democrats on picking the Republican candidate and accused the moribund state political party of now having two nominees in Alabama. This was an especially odd allegation putting aside the fact that nobody could seriously confuse Britt was a liberal or a Democrat. After all, the recent operating procedure of Democrats has been to try to help Republicans nominate the most extreme and controversial candidates and that would have definitely been Brooks.

U.S. Senate races predicted thus far:

0 D, 1 R (1 Safe)

Total with predictions thus far:

36 D (36 Holdover) 30 R (29 Holdover, 1 Safe)