Jeff Sessions won’t be returning to his old job.
Sessions was defeated by Republican opponent Tommy Tuberville, Auburn University’s former head football coach, in their Alabama Senate primary runoff Tuesday night. He now takes on Democratic incumbent Sen. Doug Jones in November.
Sessions was trailing Tuberville in the polls, despite outspending his rival in their prolonged race for the nomination. He also increasingly attacked Tuberville for his inexperience and not agreeing to a debate, especially after Tuberville edged him out in their March 3 primary.
Sessions stepped down as Alabama’s 20-year Republican senator in 2017 to become President Trump’s attorney general. The pair’s relationship frayed after Alabama’s ex-state attorney general recused himself from overseeing then-special prosecutor Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia election interference and collusion with the Trump team.
Though an early Trump supporter who pushed the president’s immigration agenda as head of the Justice Department, Sessions’s decision enraged the president. Sessions eventually resigned in 2018 after repeated disagreements, which were often aired on Twitter. Trump still harbored resentment during Sessions’s primary, refusing to endorse him.
“Jeff Sessions is a disaster who has let us all down,” Trump tweeted over the weekend. “We don’t want him back in Washington!”
Big Senate Race in Alabama on Tuesday. Vote for @TTuberville, he is a winner who will never let you down. Jeff Sessions is a disaster who has let us all down. We don’t want him back in Washington!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 11, 2020
Jones succeeded Sessions via a 2017 special election against Roy Moore by only 2 percentage points. Moore ran an embattled bid amid a flurry of sexual misconduct allegations at the height of the #MeToo movement. The former Alabama Supreme Court justice denied any impropriety.
Jones, who successfully prosecuted two Ku Klux Klan members over the 1963 Birmingham church bombing, is the most vulnerable Senate Democrat this 2020 cycle. Democrats need to gain three to four seats if they want to win control of the chamber in the fall. Alabama presents Senate Republicans with their best pickup opportunity.
An Auburn University at Montgomery poll conducted from July 2-9 found Tuberville leads Jones by 8 points. Sessions was in front of Jones by 6 points.
