Alabama House votes to end special elections

The Hill

The Alabama state House voted Tuesday to end special elections for appointments to U.S. Senate seats.

The bill passed 67-31 on a largely party-line vote, according to the Montgomery Advertiser, despite a filibuster attempt from state House Democrats.

Under current law, if a vacancy occurs in one of Alabama's Senate seats, the governor appoints a temporary replacement and is required to hold a special election to fill the seat for the remainder of the term.

State Rep. Steve Clouse's (R) bill would change the law to require a special election to coincide with the next election cycle, allowing a governor's appointee to serve until the next general election instead of forcing the governor to call an earlier election.

Clouse told the Advertiser the bill was about saving the state money and has “nothing to do” with the candidates in the December 2017 special election, which saw Sen. Doug Jones (D) defeat Republican Roy Moore in a stunning upset.

Clouse said the 2017 special election cost the state $11 million.

“It has everything to do with the cost to the General Fund,” he said.

Under the bill, if a Senate vacancy occurred before Jan. 8, 2018, when the candidate qualifying process began, the election would be held in November 2018. If it occurred on Jan. 8 or after, the election would be held in 2020.

The bill will now head to the state Senate for a vote.

The Alabama special election gained national attention and became a source of controversy after The Washington Post reported allegations from multiple women who said Moore engaged in sexual misconduct with them when they were as young as 14.

And the GOP is still butthurt as hell over their boy Roy and his loss. Acting like how Trump said he would if he would lose in 2016.

Man we lost last election so hard, we're waiting for another beating!

@nintendoboy16: You do realise right, that this law goes both ways.

So if the people in Alabama are dissatisfied. They can just as they have several times, vote for a democratic governor.

Does it even matter anymore?

God Damn jessica chastain is hot. Even w/ that man chin.

Clouse told the Advertiser the bill was about saving the state money and has “nothing to do” with the candidates in the December 2017 special election, which saw Sen. Doug Jones (D) defeat Republican Roy Moore in a stunning upset.

Suuuure! Of course it didn't

Don't many states already do this, or is there some time frame that needs to be met if an absent seat is more than X amount of years from the next election?

Just like Republicans to strip political power away from people as soon as they start to use it against them. Like how they destroyed the Supreme Court filibuster as soon as they wanted a clean up or down vote on a Supreme Court candidate. Like how they gave a bunch of executive powers to the position of governor of North Carolina when it was a Republican then stripped them when it was a Democrat. Like how they exempted bills that reduced the deficit from the filibuster, then used accounting tricks to exempt a bill that increased the deficit. Hypocritical, unprincipled, cynical, self-interested liars, all of them.

@HoolaHoopMan: They do, yeah. IIRC you’re from Minnesota, right? Your governor can just appoint a senator to take Al Franken’s seat.

I am, and kind of why I questioned it. Honestly, I see shades of gray here. Less than 12 months until an election, fine let an interim person take over. >4 years? Much different scenario.

It's not something I have really given that much thought to or heard pros and cons on.

It's surprisingly difficult to get information on this. There's no easy list when you google it (except one that doesn't seem to be current), you just have to mine for information on each state.

Anyway, I see more cons to appointments than pros. It could be years into a governor's term that the seat becomes vacant, what if the population no longer approves of them as governor? Does the fact that a Republican governor was elected mean they want a Republican senator? What about cases like Roy Moore, where the candidate is way outside the party mainstream and mired in scandal? How about where someone decides to sell a seat like Rod Blagojevich?

Even more disturbing to me, though, is Republicans changing the rules just after they lost. Special election, appointment, it doesn't make that much of a difference to me. What makes a difference is that Republicans increasingly seem to view politics as a way to rig government to serve them, and when it doesn't they just change the rules. That's no way for a government to operate.