Rep. Steve King fired a shot at Senate Republican leaders on Thursday night for their failure to move the Trump agenda forward while they’ve found the time to attack a pro-Trump candidate.
“Judge Roy Moore told to withdraw by Senators who won’t or can’t help move Trump agenda,” read the tweet from King that included reference to Breitbart News reporting.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was associated with ferocious attacks against Judge Roy Moore in a primary runoff election between Moore and McConnell’s handpicked candidate Luther Strange. An estimated $30 million was spent against Moore and for Strange in that election.
Early on Thursday, the Washington Post published one allegation of inappropriate conduct with a 14-year-old girl that she claimed happened when Moore was in his 30s. The Jeff Bezos owned Post’s editorial board endorsed Moore’s Democrat opponent in the race for the U.S. Senate seat formerly held by now U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
After the allegations ran in the Post, McConnell and fellow Republican establishment Senators wasted no time calling on Moore to leave the race if the allegations were true. The Senators joining McConnell have been among the most defiant in resisting and stalling the Trump administration agenda — Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH), and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). Collins, Murkowski and McCain participated in sinking efforts to repeal and replace Obamacare.
Moore shot back against the allegations in the Post story, “These allegations are completely false and are a desperate political attack by the National Democrat Party and the Washington Post on this campaign.”
Thursday evening Moore began tweeting repudiations of the report and the forces he said are behind it, “The Obama-Clinton Machine’s liberal media lapdogs just launched the most vicious and nasty round of attacks against me I’ve EVER faced!…The forces of evil will lie, cheat, steal –– even inflict physical harm –– if they believe it will silence and shut up Christian conservatives like you and me…”
Moore declared his resolve to “stand up and fight back against the forces of evil waging an all-out war on our conservative values!” and vowed to “NEVER GIVE UP the fight!”
Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill told CNN on Thursday that Moore’s name would not be removed from the ballot.
A New Yorker reporter reached Atlanta Tea Party co-founder Debbie Dooley, a Moore supporter, via phone and was met with laughter from Dooley at mention of the Post report. “I think the allegations are bullshit,” she told the outlet. Dooley asserted, “People are pulling out all the stops to prevent Roy Moore from being elected senator, because he will change things.”
Follow Michelle Moons on Twitter @MichelleDiana