An uphill battle faces U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Huntsville) in his fight for political survival against U.S. Senate primary rival Katie Britt, who outperformed her standing in the polls leading up to Tuesday’s election.
As of reporting time with 92% of the vote tallied, Britt is holding 44.7% of all votes cast. Brooks presently holds 29.2%, with U.S. Army veteran Mike Durant sitting at 23.3%.
The tones each candidate struck in their respected election night speeches precisely resembled their political personalities.
In his concession speech, Durant, a political outsider who faced an onslaught of attack ads from pro-Britt super PACs, lamented the negative nature of the race and expressed disgust with the Britt campaign’s tactics.
Brooks, in keeping with his combative nature and defiant political posture, declared his candidacy to have been “resurrected from the dead” even as “experts declared” that his campaign was “dead in the water.”
In touting the strong show of support her candidacy received across the state, Britt touched on her consistent message of asserting that Alabamians desired “new blood” in representation and presented a theme of focusing on the state’s future.
As of reporting time, Britt holds a lead in 62 of the state’s 67 counties. Polling released ahead of Tuesday appears to have grossly underestimated Britt’s strength in rural Alabama.
Britt is running neck-and-neck with Brooks in his home county of Madison, where she is garnering 36.3% of the vote, which trails Brooks’ 39.9%.
What the Brooks campaign will be banking on for next month’s runoff is moving a portion of the 21.3% of Durant’s supporters in Madison County over to his column, as a strong turnout in the six-term congressman’s home county will be crucial to his election night success.
Brooks will likely receive a boost from voter turnout in Madison County as a runoff will also be held in Alabama’s fifth congressional district, the seat which he is vacating next year.
The congressman narrowly leads Britt by just over 1% in Limestone, Morgan and Blount Counties. In Shelby County, his lead is even smaller as he has just 0.2% more votes than the first-time candidate.
What is unknown is the propensity of Durant’s voting bloc. While it is likely that a majority of Durant voters who choose to participate in the runoff election will gravitate to Brooks, the number of those individuals who show up to the polls is the central question.
Durant’s descent from clear frontrunner to third place can be attributed to the bombardment of negative ads his candidacy was subjected to from pro-Britt forces, something which the “Black Hawk Down” pilot acknowledged in his concession speech Tuesday night.
“I had integrity. I didn’t lie, I didn’t sling mud,” said Durant. “I ran the campaign that people told me they wanted to be run. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. But I don’t feel bad about it. I felt better about this than if we cheated, lied and did whatever we had to do to win and won.”
While venting his grievances to present media a day prior to the election, Durant advised that he would support Brooks in the runoff. How active he will be in opposing Britt’s candidacy in support of the congressman is yet to be determined.
As far as the negative campaign ads, Alabama voters can expect to be subjected to another month of grueling content as tensions will only heighten in the two-way race to replace retiring U.S. Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Tuscaloosa).
Britt’s well-funded super PAC apparatus, along with her own campaign infrastructure, is sure to become heavily weaponized to Brooks’ detriment. However, the pro-Brooks Club for Growth Action and other lesser-known PACs will likely increase their ad presence in the Yellowhammer State and continue their offensive against Britt.
The runoff election will take place June 21, 2022.
Dylan Smith is a staff writer for Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @DylanSmithAL
