Gang-tackled and gang-banged....

Sessions gets gang-tackled in bid for his old seat

Tuesday's primary could be make-or-break for the former attorney general, who is battling just to get into a runoff for the GOP nomination to face endangered Democrat Doug Jones.

By JAMES ARKIN and MARIANNE LEVINE

Jeff Sessions' bid to return to the Senate has hit a roadblock.

Most polling has shown the former attorney general narrowly ahead of his two rivals in Tuesday’s GOP primary in Alabama — but he’s well short of the 50 percent needed to win the nomination without a runoff. And a poor performance on Tuesday could foreshadow defeat in a one-on-one runoff, a potentially ignominious end to Sessions’ political comeback after President Donald Trump bounced him from his cabinet.

“You could paint the scenario that Jeff Sessions could win,” said Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), who is neutral in the race. “But I could paint a scenario where he gets into a tough runoff, and that he could very well lose. And I think he understands that.”

Three Republicans are competing for two spots in the likely March 31 runoff, before the nominee moves on to face vulnerable Democratic Sen. Doug Jones. Sessions, former Auburn University football coach Tommy Tuberville and Rep. Bradley Byrne are locked in an increasingly nasty battle for the nomination, with all of them trading hard-hitting ads questioning their rivals’ commitment to Trump — who has stayed out of the race thus far, despite his well-documented falling out with Sessions.

Byrne hit both rivals in an ad, Tuberville responded by attacking the other two over their support for Trump and Sessions released a late ad bashing the former football coach.

“That tells me that their internal data shows that they're all three as close as can be, and it’s a toss-up as to which two will make the runoff,” said Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.).

Whether the former attorney general faces Tuberville, who is second in most polls, or Byrne, who has run the most aggressive campaign on the ground, Sessions will be in a four-week dogfight for the likely March 31 runoff. One veteran GOP operative in the state, who requested anonymity to speak frankly, said it should concern Sessions if he finishes in the low-30-percent range Tuesday, where he has been in recent polling — but that low-to-mid-40 percent showing would be more promising.

“For all intents and purposes, he is an incumbent in Alabama. He's been on the ballot since 1994,” the operative said. “The guy is as known as you can be known as a politician. So, inside a Republican primary, I'm worried that there is that sentiment out there that, 'He didn't stand with the president, and I'm going to vote for somebody other than Jeff.'"

Sessions’ surprise announcement in November that he was seeking his former seat scrambled the race to face Jones, chasing out a top-tier candidate and relegating others — including Roy Moore, the controversial former judge whom Jones defeated in a 2017 special election after Sessions resigned — to also-ran status. But Byrne and Tuberville, who stayed in the race after Sessions' entry, have fought it out over the recent months to get a one-on-one shot at the former attorney general.

Despite the end of Sessions' tenure in the Trump administration, he has taken pains to remind Alabama voters about his longtime service and his early endorsement of the president, focusing on it during his announcement in November and his closing TV ad in the race last week.

“Others talk big about Trump, hoping to get your vote. But talk is cheap,” Sessions said in the ad. “I’ve been with him from the start because it’s the right thing for America.”

But as he’s emphasized his support for Trump, Sessions' rivals have repeatedly hit Sessions for his recusal from the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election that led to the appointment of a special counsel and his dismissal from the cabinet. Tuberville ran an ad saying Sessions “deserted President Trump,” and a Byrne spot simulated a job interview in which an actor said Sessions “let the president down and got fired.”

“I cannot find a single person in this state that will tell me that they don't think Jeff Sessions did a good job as a U.S. senator,” said Secretary of State John Merrill, a Republican who dropped out of the Senate race after Sessions declared and is not endorsing anyone in the primary. “What I consistently hear them say is they were disappointed in his performance in his role as attorney general, and that's the only thing they're frustrated or disappointed with him about.”

A source close to the Sessions campaign said what happened with Trump is “already baked in with this electorate,” and that “it either impacts them or it doesn’t.” The source said the campaign is confident Sessions will make the runoff and said polling shows Sessions is the second choice for supporters of both of the other candidates.

Tuberville is the favorite over Byrne to make the runoff, according to most Republicans closely following the race, based mostly on his strong name ID in the state and his profile as an outsider without a history in electoral politics.

Sessions hit Tuberville with two negative ads in the closing weeks, including one highlighting comments from last fall, when the football coach said he was "pissed off" at Trump over veterans' health care. Tuberville responded in a statement from his campaign by saying Alabama didn't need a "surrendering senator" like Sessions.

“Only one candidate in this race is 100 percent committed to supporting Donald Trump," Tuberville said. "Doug won’t. Jeff didn’t. Bradley hasn’t. But Tommy will."

Byrne, a third-term congressman from Mobile, said in an interview he saw a “shift in momentum” in the race in recent weeks in his favor as more voters tuned in. He also said he has concerns about his rivals in November, saying that Tuberville “hasn’t been vetted,” and Sessions' beef with Trump could depress votes in the fall. House Republican Conference Chair Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) endorsed Byrne last week.

"There are a lot of people in the Republican Party in Alabama who think that we have got an automatic win in November against Doug Jones. I don’t share that view,” Byrne said. “We all need to be taking Doug Jones more seriously as an opponent in the fall, and I think people are beginning to wake up to that a little bit. We're certainly calling it out to people's attention."

Jones had $7.4 million in the bank as of Feb. 12, more than the Republican field combined. He is running unopposed in Tuesday's Democratic primary.

In many ways, the race has followed the trajectory of GOP primaries in the age of Trump: a fight over allegiance to the president. Sessions' opening and closing ads referenced his early endorsement of Trump in 2016. Tuberville said in an ad that “God sent us Donald Trump.” The president praised Byrne at the White House following his impeachment acquittal, and the comment was in a Byrne TV ad 10 days later.

But while neither Tuberville nor Byrne has sparked the president’s ire quite like Sessions, they, too, have at times broken with Trump. After the release of the "Access Hollywood" tape in 2016, Byrne said Trump was “not fit to be president” and called for him to step aside. Meanwhile, Tuberville’s views on immigration have come under attack from his rivals, who say he supports “amnesty” based on comments he made last year.

Even if Sessions makes the runoff, there's no guarantee Trump will endorse his primary opponent. The president has kept a low public profile, but a close race against a former cabinet official he grew to despise could change that — and Trump could decide to sway the contest with a single tweet.

“As long as Trump ... just stays out of the race, then I think that Sessions has a very good shot at winning, ultimately,” Aderholt said. “But I think if he does decide to engage then I think it could be very detrimental to Sessions.”

One longtime Alabama GOP activist said everyone "holds their breath" every time their phone buzzes, and "snatches their phone up to see if it has anything to do with us."

“Sessions will live in fear for four weeks that the tweet is coming,” said another Alabama operative who has been involved in the race.