Category: Election 2020
Mt Brook Donations to Britt for Senate Signal Views from the GOP’s Business Wing
Residents of Mountain Brook may be relatively few in number, but they sent a message about their views on the Republican Party in campaign finance reports filed last week by candidates running to replace retiring U.S. Sen. Richard Shelby.
Although Mountain Brook’s population is just more than 20,000, people who live in the affluent Birmingham suburb contributed far more than any other municipality in the state to Katie Boyd Britt.
Donations from residents of Mountain Brook signal support for Britt from the traditional, business-oriented wing of the Republican Party. Read more.
Also read:
Britt Leads Rivals in Fundraising for GOP U.S. Senate Nomination
Absentee Voting Bills Pass First Vote
MONTGOMERY — Legislation dealing with absentee voting in Alabama overcame the first legislative hurdle Wednesday as the bills passed through the House Constitution, Campaigns and Elections Committee.
A bill that would allow for more sites to be opened in a county to accept in-person absentee ballots was debated and approved, as was a bill to require absentee applications be submitted earlier. Read more.
More from the Legislature:
Committee-Approved $7.6B Education Budget Includes Multiple Pay Raises
Riot, Voter Bill Taken Up in Legislature
Read complete legislative coverage
Alabama Congress Members Caught Off Guard by Violence at the Capitol
At a Wednesday morning rally near the White House, U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Huntsville, told the pro-Trump crowd that “today is the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass.” Brooks is the leader of a group of representatives challenging the Electoral College votes of three states President-elect Joe Biden won in the November election.
A few hours later, he was among hundreds of legislators hunkering down and then fleeing as Trump supporters broke through police lines and stormed into the Capitol building, leading to a lockdown that stalled certification of November’s vote. One woman was shot in the chest and died, and several law enforcement officers were injured in the melee, the District of Columbia mayor said in a press conference.
“DOORS LOCKED! CAPITOL COMPLEX BREACHED! CHAMBER DOORS LOCKED. SPEAKER LEAVES!” Brooks first tweeted while detailing his experience in the Capitol.
He later tweeted that the police evacuation of the House of Representatives was “hurried but otherwise orderly” and said he “heard loud shouting echoing down Capitol halls during evacuation.” Read more.
Maria Fortune, 2020 election
Gary Palmer, 2020 general election
Terri Sewell, 2020 general election
Absentee Ballot Season Gets Underway
Absentee ballots started showing up in county offices and going out in the mail Wednesday, which was the deadline for absentee election managers to be provided with absentee ballots and supplies.
Usually, Alabama voters must fit into narrowly defined categories to be able to vote by absentee. But for the general election, Secretary of State John Merrill has approved absentee voting for any voter who has concerns about the coronavirus. Read more about voting in the general election and voting by absentee.
Push for No-Excuse Absentee Voting Likely Going Nowhere
The Alabama Senate approved Tuesday a resolution that says it’s “imperative to the democratic process to propose and adopt” no-excuse absentee voting, but the passage of actual legislation to loosen restrictions on the ballots seems unlikely in the Republican-controlled body.
Sen. Rodger Smitherman, D-Birmingham, filed a bill Monday that would authorize no-excuse absentee voting. Smitherman’s Senate Bill 335 strikes out the list of excuses that qualify a voter for an absentee ballot and deletes a section of state law that says a voter must have one of those excuses to apply for an absentee ballot.
Some cities have been pushing for no-excuse absentee voting in recent weeks.
Read more.
New Poll Shows Tuberville Leading Sessions in Alabama Senate Race
MONTGOMERY — A new poll shows former Auburn football coach Tommy Tuberville with a double-digit lead over former U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions in the Republican runoff for U.S. Senate.
A survey conducted by Cygnal showed that if the March 31 runoff election were held today, 51.5% of voters would choose Tuberville, while 39.5% would choose Sessions. Nine percent of voters remained undecided. Read more.
In the Weeds: A Career of Fighting Has Led Byrne to Senate Showdown
MONTGOMERY — Bradley Byrne is a fighter.
That’s what Alabama’s 1st District Congressman says differentiates him from the field of other candidates in the race for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate, and there’s plenty of evidence that his previous experience backs that up.
Over a political career that has taken him from the state school board and the state Senate to the Alabama Community College System chancellor’s office and the U.S. House of Representatives, Byrne’s fights have been famous.
Perhaps the most successful was Byrne’s bout with the state’s two-year college system, which had been mired in a patronage scandal until he, a reform-minded governor and federal prosecutors came in to clean it up.
Perhaps the least successful was a run for governor in 2010 that saw him on a quixotic quest to take on the then-all-powerful state teachers’ association, only for that group to marshal untold resources to defeat him in the end.
Now Byrne finds himself in the middle of another high-profile fight as he seeks to win a U.S. Senate seat by first outmatching two better-known Republican rivals in former U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions and former Auburn football coach Tommy Tuberville. The winner of the Republican primary — or runoff, if needed — will face incumbent Democratic Sen. Doug Jones in November. Read more.
