In test of Trump's appeal, Alabama votes in US Senate runoff

WASHINGTON: Alabama state Republicans voted Tuesday in a US Senate primary that will test the extent of Donald Trump's influence on his most passionate supporters, who will choose between the president's pick and a populist local judge.
Trump is backing Luther Strange, who was appointed early this year to fill the Senate seat vacated by Jeff Sessions when the president nominated him to be the US attorney general.
"Finish the job - vote today for 'Big Luther,'" Trump tweeted early Tuesday as polls opened in Alabama. "He has proven to me that he will never let you down!"
But by all accounts, Strange is the underdog. In major recent polls, he trails rival Roy Moore, a former state chief justice and Bible-quoting conservative who, in what may have been one of the more brazen campaign moments of 2017, waved a gun before a cheering crowd at a rally.
Alabama, in the heart of the Deep South, has become the latest political battleground over the direction that the Republican leadership is taking the party in Washington. Polls close at 7pm (3am Malaysia).
While Moore leads Strange by some 11 points according to a RealClearPolitics average of polls, Trump remains popular in the state. He won Alabama by 28 points last year.
Trump's national approval rating percentage has dwelled in the thirties since mid-May, but there are large pockets of Republicans still deeply loyal to him.
In a political twist, the race is the stage for a proxy war of sorts between Trump and his recently ousted White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, who is backing Moore.

'The nation is watching'
Former vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin has also stumped for Moore, while current Vice President Mike Pence made an election-eve campaign appearance with Strange.
The race has attracted millions of dollars in outside campaign funds.
Trump is hoping to win a loyalist in Strange, 64, who has openly backed Trump's agenda.
But Trump's conservative base has signaled for months that it is not beholden to Republican leaders in Washington, and they could even break with the president in the Alabama race.
Trump has hedged his bets, even suggesting in a campaign appearance Friday in Alabama that he "might have made a mistake" in endorsing Strange.
"If his opponent wins, I'm going to be here campaigning like hell for him" in the general election, Trump said.
Moore has threatened to upend the Republican Party should he win the race, and has branded his opponent an "establishment lackey" to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
He is a fierce enemy of McConnell, accusing him of rejecting conservative efforts to pull the agenda further to the right.
Moore is the more Trump-like of the candidates: opinionated, unconcerned about whom he may offend and desperate to upend the elite system that rules the US capital.
"For whatever reason, God has put me in this election at this time, and all the nation is watching" the Alabama race, Moore said Monday night in his final campaign rally before the primary election.
Bannon, who campaigned with Moore on Monday, joined in the Washington bashing, saying party elites think Alabama voters are nothing but "a pack of morons" who will follow the herd.
"You're going to get an opportunity to tell them what you think of the elites who run this country," Bannon said.
Alabama has not elected a Democrat to the Senate in a quarter century, so whoever prevails in the Republican runoff – necessitated because neither candidate won an outright majority in the initial primary in August – will likely win the Dec 12 general election against Democratic nominee Doug Jones.
Moore, reveling in his populist appeal, rode his horse Sassy to the Gallant Fire Hall to cast his vote.
The 70-year-old was twice suspended from the Alabama Supreme Court for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples and fighting against orders to remove a 10 Commandments monument from the court house.
His defiance made him a local hero to many, and that anti-establishment streak was on display Monday, when Moore, wearing a cowboy hat and vest, pulled a small pistol from his pocket and showed it briefly to the crowd.
"I believe in the Second Amendment" that protects Americans' gun rights, he boomed, to loud applause and cheers.
But it is rival Strange who has secured the cherished endorsement of the National Rifle Association, the leading pro-gun lobbying group that has reportedly dropped about US$1 million in ads attacking Moore. — AFP