Sen. Luther Strange (R-Ala.) blasted Breitbart News chief Stephen Bannon on Wednesday, pinning responsibility on him for Democrat Doug Jones’s victory in Alabama’s special Senate election.
“I have never seen him accomplish anything,” Strange said on Fox News. “He has accomplished one thing that I don’t think anybody in America thought was possible. And that’s getting a Democrat elected in the state of Alabama.”
Bannon, who served as President Trump’s chief strategist until August, boosted the campaign of GOP candidate Roy Moore in the Alabama Senate race, and has backed a number of insurgent Republican candidates across the country in an effort to challenge GOP lawmakers he deems part of the Washington establishment.
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“For someone who has only been in Washington for like two months at the time, I sure got to be part of the establishment in record time,” Strange joked. He lost his bid against Moore in the GOP primary where he was seen as the underdog.
Strange, who was appointed earlier this year to temporarily fill the Senate seat vacated by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, was backed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), whom Bannon has vowed to oust from power.
Moore’s candidacy, however, was riddled with controversy and scandal, particularly after multiple women came forward last month to accuse him of pursuing sexual or romantic relations with them while they were teenagers and he was in his 30s.
Asked by Fox News’s Neil Cavuto on Wednesday on whether he had any advice for Moore after his defeat, Strange demurred, saying that he had already made his “case against him.”
“I’m not going to give Mr. Moore any advice. I made my case against him,” Strange said. “The voters chose otherwise in the primary and that brings us to today. But he’s on his own.”
Moore has not yet conceded the raise to Jones, who is the first Democrat to be elected to the Senate in Alabama in 25 years.