Alabama – Doug Jones Wins Senate Race

Black, brown, and millennial voters -- and Black women in particular -- turned out in historic numbers to send a Democratic candidate to the Senate from Alabama for the first time since 1992.

This historic win is more than just a crushing blow to Donald Trump's agenda of bigotry, hate, and division. It's also a powerful reminder that progressives can win anywhere and everywhere if we stand up for an inclusive populist political agenda and build campaigns that welcome, energize, and mobilize the new American majority of Black, brown, and progressive white voters.

Doug Jones, a Democratic former prosecutor who mounted a seemingly quixotic Senate campaign in the face of Republican dominance here, defeated his scandal-scarred opponent, Roy S. Moore, after a brutal campaign marked by accusations of sexual abuse and child molestation against the Republican, according to The Associated Press.

The upset delivered an unimagined victory for Democrats and shaved Republicans’ unstable Senate majority to a single seat.

Mr. Jones’s victory could have significant consequences on the national level, snarling Republicans’ legislative agenda in Washington and opening, for the first time, a realistic but still difficult path for Democrats to capture the Senate next year. It amounted to a stinging snub of President Trump, who broke with much of his party and fully embraced Mr. Moore’s candidacy, seeking to rally support for him in the closing days of the campaign.

Amid thunderous applause from his supporters at a downtown hotel, Mr. Jones held up his victory as a message to Washington from voters fed up with political warfare. For once, he said, Alabama had declined to take “the wrong fork” at a political crossroads.

“We have shown the country the way that we can be unified,” Mr. Jones declared, draping his election in the language of reconciliation and consensus. “This entire race has been about dignity and respect. This campaign has been about the rule of law.”

"I want to just say this, folks, we have come so far. We have come so far and the people of Alabama have spoken. They have said we — [cheers and applause] They have said to each other that this, I have said from the very beginning this campaign has never been about me, it’s never been about Roy Moore. It has been about everyone of you, every one of you and your sons and daughters. It’s all of those volunteers that knocked on 300,000 doors. It’s the volunteers who made 1.2 million phone calls around this state.

It’s those volunteers to make sure that we knew, it was every community. You know, I keep hearing about the different communities in this state. The African-American community, thank you. [Cheers and applause]

My friends — my friends in the Latino community, thank you. To all my Jewish friends, happy Hanukkah. We have built this everywhere we have gone. We have had that same energy. We’ve had that same excitement. At the end of the day, this — this entire race has been about dignity and respect. This campaign — this campaign has been about the rule of law.

This cam — this campaign has been about common courtesy and decency, and making sure everyone in this state, regardless of which ZIP code you live in, is going to get a fair shake in life. And let me just say this, folks, to all of those — all of my future colleagues in Washington, to all — I had such wonderful help.

But I want to make sure, in all seriousness, there are important issues facing this country. There are important issues of health care and jobs and the economy. And I want to — I would like, as everyone in the entire probably free world knows right now, we’ve tried to make sure that this campaign was about finding common ground and reaching across and actually getting things done for the people.

So, I — I have a challenge. I have this challenge to my future colleagues in Washington. Don’t wait on me. Take this election from the great state of Alabama — [cheers and applause] Let me finish. Take this election — take this election where the people of Alabama said we want to get something done, we want you to find common ground, we want you to talk. Take this opportunity, in light of this election, and go ahead and fund that CHIP program before I get up there. Put it aside and let’s do it for those million kids and 150,000 here in Birmingham"