MONTGOMERY, Alabama — Judge Roy Moore, the GOP nominee for the U.S. Senate in Alabama, told nationally syndicated radio host Sean Hannity on Friday afternoon that his campaign is conducting its own investigation into the allegations against him and has “some evidence of some collusion” against him.
Moore said when Hannity asked him to respond to the dozens of establishment Republicans demanding he step down from his race for the U.S. Senate:
If you step aside for any allegation, then you might as well not run because when you run you’re going to get allegations. First, I would tell these individuals they wouldn’t make good judges. They wouldn’t make good people in the judicial system because you are innocent until proven guilty. In this case, this woman has waited over 40 years to bring a complaint four weeks out of an election? It’s obvious to the casual observer that something is up. We’re also doing an investigation and we have some evidence of some collusion here but we’re not ready to put that to the public just yet.
Hannity, in response, asked Moore whether that means he is “trying to prove” his innocence—to which Moore affirmed that he was:
Well, just like you said, they’re doing it to defeat this senate campaign. They’re bringing something, they’re trying to mix something up from other girls that never said anything about sexual impropriety and they’re all labeling it on this 14-year-old. I had nothing to do with this. This is a completely manufactured story meant to defraud this campaign. They’re losing. They’re 11 points behind. They don’t like my acknowledgment there is a God. We’ve refused to debate them because of their very liberal stance on transgenderism and transgenderism in the military and bathrooms. They’re desperate. Sean, they’re simply desperate.
Next, Hannity pressed Moore on specifically on what he thinks about the idea of a Senate candidate dating young girls:
HANNITY: “Well, let me ask you a general question.”
MOORE: “Yes.”
HANNITY: “Let’s take you out of this for a second. Let’s say, if any Senate candidate who was 32 at the time had done this to a 14-year-old girl, to me it’s disgusting. To me, it would be despicable. To me, that is a predator.”
MOORE: “Yeah.”
HANNITY: “Do you agree with me, that no such person who ever does that should ever be in the United States Senate?”
MOORE: “Of course. Nobody who abuses a 14-year-old at age 32 or age 17—it doesn’t matter—if you abuse a 14-year-old you shouldn’t be a Senate candidate. I agree with that. But I did not do that.”
HANNITY: “Let’s go back to it one more question, because I didn’t understand this. If you were 32, and you do date a 17 or 18 year old—that’s a pretty big gap for a pretty young girl—is that something that you did when you were dating? I’m not talking about the 14-year-old in that specific allegation. Would it be normal behavior back in those days for you to date a girl that’s 17 or 18?”
MOORE: “No. Not normal.”
HANNITY: “My daughter is 16 years old. If she’s 17 or 18, I don’t want her dating a 32-year-old.”
MOORE: “I wouldn’t either.”
HANNITY: “And you can say unequivocally that you never dated anybody that was in their late teens like that when you were 32?”
MOORE: “It would have been out of my customary behavior, that’s right.”
HANNITY: “In other words, you don’t recall dating any girl that young when you were that old?”
MOORE: “I’ve said no.”
HANNITY: “And you think that’s inappropriate, too, that’s what you’re saying?”
MOORE: “Yes.”
Hannity wrapped the segment, the second of three total, by noting that he believes there is certainly the possibility that Judge Moore is being wrongly accused. Hannity said:
A lot of things come up in elections. This is not my first rodeo, Judge. I’ve covered a lot of big topics over the years and I know a lot of people rush to judgment and in my life I try not to do that. This is such a serious allegation at such a significant point in this race. My only goal is not ideological here, my goal is to get to truth. Richard Jewell, I was in Atlanta, and then an article comes out that he fits the profile of a lone bomber because he lives with his mother. We saw what happened in the Duke Lacrosse case—those three kids were falsely accused. We saw that the whole nation and the president was wrong on issues like Ferguson, Missouri—hands up don’t shoot never happened. George Zimmerman was found not guilty by a jury of his peers. Darren Wilson was exonerated by a grand jury because of eyewitnesses that saw the Michael Brown incident. Then you have the case of Freddie Gray, everybody thought those policemen did horrible things and there were all not guilty. There was no evidence on any of those case so there are instances where—Clarence Thomas, I would argue is a case. Herman Cain is a case.
Hannity then cut to commercial, before the Judge joined him for a third segment. More to come.
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