How could Alabama wind up with a worse GOP senator than Luther Strange, who took an appointment from the governor his office was investigating? Meet Roy Moore, the twice-disgraced former chief justice of the state supreme court. Moore interviewed for the Senate appointment that ultimately went to Strange, and his spokesperson now says he’s been asked to run for the Senate in 2018 as well as for governor and state attorney general, and is “weighing his options for the future, but his main concern right now is the pending appeal to restore him to the Office he was elected to by the citizens of Alabama.”
As his spokesperson alludes, Moore was suspended from office last year for defying federal court's orders on same-sex marriage. In 2003, Moore was removed from the bench for refusing to comply with a federal judge's order to remove a monument of the Ten Commandments from the grounds of the state supreme court. It’s unclear how interested Moore is in a run against Strange, who won’t need to face primary voters until June of 2018, or for the other two offices.
But Moore already has run for governor twice, though neither campaign went well. In 2006, Moore challenged Gov. Bob Riley in the primary and lost 67-33. Four years later, Moore ran to succeed the termed-out Riley and took just 19 percent in the primary, enough for a weak fourth-place finish. But in 2012, just after Moore flirted with a presidential bid, he ran for his old job on the court and took just over 50 percent against two opponents, allowing him to win without a runoff. Moore struggled in the general election but beat his Democratic foe 52-48. Moore’s bumpy electoral history suggests he’d have trouble in a GOP primary for any office, but that he may still have enough fans to make things interesting.