The Senate campaign arm of the Republican Party on Friday severed ties with Roy Moore, one day after the Washington Post reported that Moore had sexually assaulted a 14-year-old girl and pursued inappropriate relationships with several other teenagers while he was a district attorney in his 30s.
As the Daily Beast first reported, a joint fundraising committee supporting Moore’s election bid and the Republican Party filed paperwork Friday morning dropping the National Republican Senatorial Committee from its list of beneficiaries. The Alabama Republican Party and the Republican National Committee remain linked to the campaign.
Moore has strongly denied the allegations, calling them a “the very definition of fake news and intentional defamation.”
After supporting incumbent Luther Strange in the Sept. 26 special primary, the NRSC initially threw its weight behind Moore in the general election against Democrat Doug Jones.
“Our focus is always on keeping a strong Republican majority in the Senate, and that includes Alabama,” NRSC chairman Cory Gardner said in a statement at the time. “Roy Moore will be imperative to passing a conservative agenda, and we support him in keeping this seat in Republican hands.”
But Gardner changed his tune after the allegations against Moore became public, saying he should drop out of the election if they proved true. The committee’s decision to sever ties indicates they’ve heard enough to withdraw their support.
Alabama Republicans, meanwhile, have closed ranks around their candidate, with many claiming the allegations were a Democratic conspiracy, others diminishing their significance, and some even saying they’d still support Moore even if the allegations of sexual abuse were true.
“I would vote for Judge Moore because I wouldn’t want to vote for Doug,” Bibb County chairman Jerry Pow told Daniel Dale of the Toronto Star. “I’m not saying I support what he did.”
