Labelled a “firebrand”, “bombastic evangelical” and the “Ten Commandments judge” Roy Moore, beat Trump’s pick for the Alabama primary, Sen. Luther Strange. Moore’s convincing victory is likely to have shaken the GOP, including President Trump, who had openly supported Strange ahead of the party’s anti-establishment wing, even pleading with voters days before to back Strange. Despite Trumps backing, and an advertising campaign in the region of more than $10 million in his favor, Strange failed to secure victory, which has highlighted the narrow limits of Trumps influence.
Moore’s controversial political history is well known in Alabama. In the 90s he was fired from his post as county judge after refusing to remove a plaque of the Ten Commandments from the wall of his courtroom. In 2000 he won a race for chief justice of the state’s Supreme Court but was again fired after refusing to remove a 5000-pound Ten Commandments monument from the judicial building. In 2012 he came back into the political arena and was elected chief justice again, but just 4 years later was suspended after ordering judges not to issue marriage certificates to gay couples.
At his victory party Moore made his Christian stance very clear. He said:
“We have to return the knowledge of God and the Constitution of the United States to the United States Congress,”
“I believe we can make America great, but we must make America good. And we cannot make America good without acknowledging the sovereign source of that goodness … which is almighty God.”
He also admitted that he hadn’t prayed for an election victory, but conceded that it was “in the hands of the Almighty.”
Moore’s proud mention of his Christian beliefs will remind everyone that he is not cast from the present political mould. He’s more closely aligned to the conservative era, when his outspoken views on homosexuality made him a national figure.
Quick to congratulate Moore on his win, President Trump is sure to be one of many who have been asking the question: “If an upstart judge can take down a sitting senator with a wealth of resources at his disposal, is anyone in the establishment safe?”
Louise Carter
