A top White House official suggested Thursday that President Trump might support estranged former Attorney General Jeff Sessions for a Senate seat in Alabama in 2020 if the choice comes down to Mr. Sessions and Democratic Sen. Doug Jones.
White House senior counselor Kellyanne Conway said the president doesn’t want to deny or deprive Alabama of their right to choose, despite a report that Mr. Trump has discouraged Mr. Sessions from running. Mr. Sessions, who held the Senate seat for 20 years, is expected to announce a new bid Thursday.
Asked by reporters if the president would support Mr. Sessions, Mrs. Conway replied, “Well, we’d love to have a Republican senator there. We think that Jones has been a reliable liberal vote on way too many things, really disappointing — obviously not representing the interests of the people of Alabama as well as he could be.”
She said of Mr. Sessions’ planned announcement, “[It’s a] free country, people can file.”
“The voters of Alabama should have the right to decide — the Republican voters can decide who their nominee is, and then the voters of Alabama can decide who their senator will be,” she said.
The president has called his appointment of Mr. Sessions as attorney general as his “biggest mistake,” saying Mr. Sessions should not have recused himself from special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. He has called Mr. Sessions “weak” and an “idiot.”
Mr. Trump then fired him in November 2018. Mr. Sessions, the first Republican senator to endorse Mr. Trump’s candidacy in 2016, has remained generally supportive of the president’s policies.
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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