If not for Alabama’s Democratic Sen. Doug Jones, Republicans would currently be embroiled in a process with “devastating” effects on the party’s appeal with women, as Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., sees it.
Asked in a Wednesday editorial board meeting with the Washington Examiner if Roy Moore’s Senate candidacy hurt the GOP’s appeal with female voters, the current chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee argued that Moore’s loss actually spared Republicans something much worse. “I think what happened in Alabama would have been devastating with women,” said Gardner, “because we would be here today talking about the expulsion of Roy Moore.”
After allegations of sexual misconduct and assault surfaced against Moore, Gardner, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, called for him to be expelled if his candidacy succeeded, asserting in November that the GOP nominee did “not meet the ethical and moral requirements of the United States Senate.”
Reflecting on the lessons of that December special election for Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ seat in the upper chamber, Gardner said, “I think we learned that candidates matter in a huge, huge way.”
“We had an incumbent, Luther Strange, who was supported as the incumbent. You can argue whether somebody else should have been the nominee or not, but he was the incumbent, and I think the mess was created in Alabama when the governor decided to have an affair that lead us down this path. And you had all kinds of trips after that that were set off,” Gardner reasoned.
Asked by Washington Examiner if he was happy Jones prevailed, Gardner replied, “I am happy that Roy Moore is not the senator.”
