WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump on Monday offered his most explicit endorsement to date regarding Roy Moore, the Republican Senate candidate in Alabama who has been accused of making unwanted sexual advances on teenagers when he was in his 30s.
"We need Republican Roy Moore to win in Alabama," Trump declared in an early morning tweet, leaving no question that he was supporting a Senate nominee who many other Republican leaders have repudiated and called on to quit the race.
Trump tweeted: "Democrats refusal to give even one vote for massive Tax Cuts is why we need Republican Roy Moore to win in Alabama. We need his vote on stopping crime, illegal immigration, Border Wall, Military, Pro Life, V.A., Judges 2nd Amendment and more. No to Jones, a Pelosi/Schumer Puppet!"
Trump has delivered similar messages in recent days, criticizing Democratic nominee Doug Jones as a liberal beholden to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.
[PRESIDENT TRUMP: Timeline, appointments, executive orders + guide to actions in first 200 days]
The Alabama race has drawn national attention in the weeks since The Washington Post first reported accusations by multiple women that Moore initiated unwanted sexual encounters with them while he was in his 30s and they were teenagers. Moore has denied the allegations.
On Monday, the Post reported that one of the women, Debbie Wesson Gibson, had found a graduation card from Moore, who she said she had publicly dated when she was 17 and he was 34. She said she regarded the relationship "like a badge of honor" until she began re-evaluating it in light of the accounts of other women and Moore's own denials.
Gibson said she was in her attic hauling out boxes of Christmas decorations last week when she noticed a storage bin she had forgotten about. Inside was a scrapbook from her senior year of high school, and taped to a page titled "Those Who Inspire" was a graduation card.
"Happy graduation Debbie," it read in slanted cursive handwriting. "I wanted to give you this card myself. I know that you'll be a success in anything you do. Roy."
Shortly after the allegations first surfaced, Moore said in a radio interview with Sean Hannity that he did not know Leigh Corfman, who said she was 14 when Moore touched her sexually, but that he remembered Gibson as well as Gloria Thacker Deason, who had told the Post that she dated Moore when she was 18. He called each one "a good girl" and said he did not remember dating them.
But at two campaign events in recent days, Moore has backtracked.
At a Nov. 27 event in the north Alabama town of Henagar, Moore said: "The allegations are completely false. They are malicious. Specifically, I do not know any of these women."
At a Nov. 29 rally at a church in the south Alabama town of Theodore, Moore said, "Let me state once again: I do not know any of these women, did not date any of these women and have not engaged in any sexual misconduct with anyone."
Gibson said that after finding the scrapbook, she was not sure whether to make it public given the threats she received after publication of the original story. Then she heard what Moore said last week, she said, and contacted the Post.
"He called me a liar," said Gibson, who says she not only openly dated Moore when she was 17 but later joined him in passing out fliers during his campaign for circuit court judge in 1982 and exchanged Christmas cards with him over the years. "Roy Moore made an egregious mistake to attack that one thing -- my integrity."
In his past comments, Trump has stopped short of naming Moore and unequivocally endorsing him in the special election, to be held Dec. 12.
In addition to the Twitter posts, Trump called Moore on Monday to throw him his support, White House spokesman Raj Shah said in an email.
Moore tweeted that Trump had offered his full support and said he needs a fighter to help him in the Senate. He quoted the president as saying, "Go get 'em, Roy!"
"President Trump knows that the future of his conservative agenda in Congress hinges on this election," Moore said in a statement. "I look forward to fighting alongside the President to strengthen our military, secure our border, protect our gun rights, defend the sanctity of life, and confirm conservative judges to courts around this nation."
Trump will hold a rally Friday in Pensacola, Fla., his campaign committee said last week -- just miles from Alabama and four days before the Alabama election.
Trump's endorsement puts him at odds with Republican leadership and many Republicans in the Senate, who have called for Moore to drop out of the race. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell appeared to soften his stance on Sunday, though, saying during an appearance on ABC News' This Week that he was "going to let the people of Alabama make the call."
Fundraising by Moore is lagging behind that of Jones as Democrats flood the race with money in hopes of stealing a victory as the special election campaign for the seat enters the final stretch.
Democrats gave Jones $8.1 million more than donors to his rival in the period from Oct. 1 through Nov. 22, according to disclosure reports filed with the U.S. Senate on Monday.
Jones reported $9.8 million in contributions and $8.4 million in spending. He had $2.5 million in his campaign account in the closing days before the election. That compares to fundraising of $1.7 million for Moore and spending of the same amount. Moore's campaign had $636,046 on hand.
Information for this article was contributed by Philip Rucker and Stephanie McCrummen of The Washington Post; and by Toluse Olorunnipa, Bill Allison and John McCormick of Bloomberg News.
A Section on 12/05/2017