Republican Gov. John Kasich (Ohio) called on GOP Alabama Senate nominee Roy Moore to drop his bid for office in the wake of a Washington Post report that accuses Moore of inappropriate sexual conduct with a minor in 1979, saying the GOP cannot support the Alabama conservative.
“I’ve long opposed Roy Moore & his divisive viewpoints. The actions described make him unfit for office. The GOP must not support him. He should step aside,” Kasich said in a tweet on Friday.
Kasich’s comments come after the Post quoted Leigh Corfman, now 53, as saying Moore kissed her, touched her over her underwear and attempted to place her hand over his underwear when she was 14 years old.
Three other women say Moore pursued relationships with them when they were teenagers and Moore was in his early 30s.
{mosads}
Various Republicans in the Senate and in the White House have called on Moore to step aside in the race for Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s former Senate seat if the allegations are true.
Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney echoed Kasich’s condemnation of Moore, saying the conservative nominee was “unfit for office.”
“Innocent until proven guilty is for criminal convictions, not elections. I believe Leigh Corfman. Her account is too serious to ignore. Moore is unfit for office and should step aside,” Romney said in a tweet on Friday.
Moore responded to the accusations, calling them a “desperate political attack” and saying he would refuse to stand down.
“These allegations are completely false and are a desperate political attack by the National Democrat Party and the Washington Post on this campaign,” Moore said in a statement Thursday.
“The forces of evil are on the march in our country … I have a duty to stand up and fight back against the forces of evil waging an all-out war on our conservative values.”