Leading Off
● AL-Sen, AL-Gov: After Jeff Sessions resigned from the Senate to become Donald Trump's attorney general in February, then-Gov. Robert Bentley appointed fellow Republican Luther Strange to fill the seat. Bentley subsequently set the special election for November 2018 to fill the remainder of Sessions' term, meaning the winner would face another election for a full six-year term in 2020. Alabama Political Reporter now relays that newly-minted Republican Gov. Kay Ivey is considering moving up the special election date to 2017, especially with the new governor's office facing an existing lawsuit over the election timing. Secretary of State John Merrill, another Republican, says that if Ivey wants to hold the special this year, she needs to make her proclamation by May 11 or 12.
Campaign ActionMany Alabama Republicans are quite upset at how Strange's appointment unfolded, and they have good reason to be. Bentley was facing near-certain impeachment over allegations of abusing his power to conceal an affair with a top staffer, and he finally resigned on Monday as part of a plea deal.
As the state's attorney general, Strange had sent a letter to the legislature just before last Election Day imploring it to desist in their investigation into Bentley "until I am able to report to you that the necessary related work of my office has been completed." Legislators complied, seeing as they believed Strange was conducting his own investigation.
However, after Trump's presidential victory and nomination of Sessions to become his attorney general, Strange belatedly claimed in December that he never actually said he was looking into the governor, lest he look shady for coveting a Senate appointment from someone he was supposedly investigation. Once Bentley appointed Strange, his replacement as state attorney general confirmed that, oh yeah, Strange's office had been investigating Bentley all along, which Strange later conceded was true.
This ordeal angered legislators so much that it reportedly triggered their renewed push to impeach Bentley, an effort which had previously appeared to have lost steam after the scandal initially blew up earlier in 2016. Incredibly, some Republican lawmakers have even claimed that Bentley himself told them that his motivation for appointing Strange to the Senate was because he thought Strange was corrupt and wanted him out of the attorney general's office.
The whole affair has left the appointed senator quite vulnerable to a potential primary challenge in this deep-red state. Possible opponents understandably would prefer to face a special primary election sometime over the next few months while the fallout from Bentley's scandal is still fresh, rather than wait more than a full year until the regularly scheduled primary in June of 2018, which would give Strange more time to benefit from his incumbency and for the scandal to fade.
While no Republican candidates have announced a campaign against Strange yet, the less-tainted Ivey's ascension to the governor's office could very well cause some of those who were looking at running for what was supposed to be an open governor's race in 2018 to reconsider which office to seek. Indeed, state Senate President Pro Tem Del Marsh has been considering either race, and he and others might figure they would have an easier shot running against a senator deeply tied to Bentley's troubles than a governor who had been separately elected to the lieutenant governor's office instead of on a ticket with Bentley.
from Daily Kos http://ift.tt/2ovp05B
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