Along the intellectual path of goat entrails and special elections, ruby red Alabama had a special election yesterday, and its results must have left Republicans a little aghast.
An Alabama Democrat who campaigned aggressively on abortion access won a special election in the state Legislature on Tuesday, sending a message that abortion remains a winning issue for Democrats, even in the deep South.
Marilyn Lands won a state House seat in a rare competitive race to represent a district that includes parts of Huntsville. Lands, a mental health professional, centered her bid on reproductive rights and criticized the state’s near-total abortion ban along with a recent state Supreme Court ruling that temporarily banned in vitro fertilization. [Politico]
Competitive, yes, but …
Lands ran for the seat in 2022 and lost by 7 points to Republican David Cole, who resigned last year after pleading guilty to voter fraud.
Lands’ margin of victory? Almost 25 points. Sure, politics is generally local, and perhaps her opponent, Republican Teddy Powell, was a poor candidate – but a swing of some thirty points or more is not a mistake.
It’s more of a sign. In neon.
It’ll be interesting to keep an eye on Alabama and its local Republican Party, to see if SCOTUS‘ Dobbs decision, and the Alabama State Supreme Court’s threats to IVF, not to mention their clownish pair of Senators, Katie Britt (R-AL) of the State Of The Union Response Speech fame, and Tommy Tuberville, who endangered national security by holding up officer promotions in a temper tantrum over abortion services, suddenly transform Alabama into a purple State. Don’t forget, the last time the Republicans nominated a real clown for Senator, Judge Roy Moore, who was of a theocratic temperament and an alleged, but unproven so far as I know, sexual predator, Alabama voters narrowly rejected the Republican in favor of Doug Jones (D-AL).
