Alabama Senate Primary Splits the GOP in DC

Rep. Mo Brooks, Katie Britt, and Mike Durant are vying to replace Richard Shelby. A runoff is likely.

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Last spring, Alabama Rep. Mo Brooks was leading the pack in the Republican primary race to succeed retiring GOP Sen. Richard Shelby. Then, for him, came a series of unfortunate events.

His downward trajectory began in August, when a crowd of his supporters booed him for suggesting they ought to move past the 2020 presidential election. Soon his two biggest Republican primary rivals—former Shelby chief of staff Katie Britt and retired Army pilot Mike Durant—caught up to him in the polls and began out-fundraising him. Brooks’ waning momentum then quickly became evident to former President Donald Trump, who in late March rescinded his endorsement.

Whether or not these developments will seal Brooks’ fate could become clear in just a few hours, when Alabama voters head to the polls and pick their Republican nominee for the state’s open U.S. Senate seat. Brooks has regained some polling ground in recent days, but the race is still tight and likely headed to a June 21 runoff, as no candidate is likely to surpass the 50 percent threshold required to win Tuesday’s primary. RealClearPolitics’ polling average has Britt with a slight edge over Durant and Brooks, who are neck-and-neck in the race for the second runoff spot. 

High-profile Republican lawmakers and organizations look to be just as divided as the electorate. Brooks has the National Rifle Association, the Club for Growth, and GOP Sens. Rand Paul and Ted Cruz in his corner. But he faces stiff competition from Durant, a wealthy businessman and former prisoner of war, and Britt, an attorney and former CEO of the Business Council of Alabama who has secured fundraising support from GOP Sens. Shelby, Mike Crapo, Deb Fischer, Shelley Moore Capito, Jim Inhofe, and Joni Ernst. 

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  1. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    How about “None of the Above”? That’s the name I want to vote for.

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  2. Butch Kamena

    I spent a week in Birmingham at the end of March, at the point when Trump dropped his endorsement of Brooks. The vitriol of the campaign ads was astounding. Lots of accusations of RINO being thrown around, just the entire tone from all of the candidates was vicious.

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    1. Peyton Yarbrough

      Yes. It's disgusting. It's like right wing virtue signaling. GUNS! I'm not a liberal they're a liberal! GUNS! They're a RINO! Drain the swamp! Trump likes me best! GUNS!!!

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  3. Jared Meyer

    As an Alabamian, I was cautiously optimistic about Britt early on, and still think she's probably the most competent and would be less Trumpy than the others, but good grief, her campaigning HAS been negative lately (as my endless stream of mailers and text message spam from her campaign would attest). And sure, Brooks deserves every attack he gets — but she's attacking him by sucking up to Trump now, painting herself as the more MAGA candidate, and I just don't know if I can stomach it. I know to win any Republican election these days you have to walk a fine line and at least try not to anger the MAGA base, but she seems to have started going too far the other way, and that's disappointing and disturbing. Ultimately, I guess as long as Mo Brooks loses, I will count that as a silver lining in whatever clouds remain.

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    1. Peyton Yarbrough

      As a fellow Alabamian, I am quite confident that Katie Britt is a closet normal. Our election ads are so ridiculous you would think they were written by SNL writers parodying each candidate trying to get to the right of everyone else they're against. (Grandma Ivey, can't high step a highsteppa, POW POW POW! lol)

      But unfortunately here, you absolutely have to placate the MAGA rabble, and that's what she is doing. I wish it weren't the case, but here we are. Hopefully she wins out.

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      1. Jared Meyer

        lol — a "closet normal" is the perfect way to put it. I know Richard Shelby could have behaved a little bit better during the Trump years (especially with regards to stolen election claims), but speaking the truth as much as he did in our current political climate makes him an absolute hero compared to some of the other players on the board (Tuberville, Brooks, etc.), and her close association with him gives me hope...

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    2. Avatar photo
      Dusty

      It's not a popular thing to say, but the reality is that politics requires compromise. For example, here in Connecticut we have a kind of opposite of the problem you have in Alabama. The GOP nominee for Senate, Themis Klarides, is both pro-choice and anti-gun. All things being equal, I would not vote for her for Senate.

      But, all things are not equal. And in Connecticut, I want to nominate the most conservative candidate *that can win. So, perhaps ideologically I agree more with some of the other candidates, but they're not as competitive as Klarides, so I want her to be the nominee. Is she going to be great on those issues? No. But she'll be better than Richard Blumenthal on them, and much better than him on everything else.

      In red states like Alabama, it's the opposite dynamic. Traditional conservatives/classical liberals (however you want to identify, sounds like we're largely on the same page) should want the least MAGA candidate *that can win.

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    3. Kevin Ashley Wilson

      As a fellow Alabamian, I agree with everything you said. I've moved from wanting to vote for Britt to just wanting to vote against Mo.

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      1. Roger

        I think Katie will settle down and be sane, whereas Brooks will not. I voted for Durant to keep Brooks out of the runoff!

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  4. Avatar photo
    Peter Schwartz

    If Brooks is the ultimate winner look for a large number of Alabama Republican voters, as they did in the case of Roy Moore, to simply not vote in the Senate race or write in someone else.

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    Dusty

    “Katie Britt is Mitch McConnell’s candidate."

    It's astonishing to me that such a line is used as an attack against a Republican primary opponent. That should be an endorsement line.

    But, here we are.

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    1. Avatar photo
      Doug B.

      It is astonishing that so many Republicans and Democrats both think Mitch McConnell is the number one obstacle to getting their agenda through the Senate.

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      1. Eric L

        Yet I wager they will support him as party leader because this allows them to fear monger consequence free as their preposterous positions will never be codified.

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