Earlier this week, a so-called test vote on a constitutional amendment required for a comprehensive gambling package failed in the Alabama Senate by one vote.
Late Tuesday, the Senate voted 20-15 on the constitutional amendment proposal that would have gone on an August special election ballot, short of the required 21 votes.
Three of the "no" votes had voted "yes" earlier in the legislative session for a Senate-authored proposal but switched their votes to no on a deal announced earlier in the day by a conference committee.
The three were State Sens. Greg Albritton (R-Atmore), Lance Bell (R-Pell City) and Chris Elliott (R-Josephine).
Despite an aggressive lobbying campaign to get Elliott to flip back to "yes," the Baldwin County Republican said he would not for the proposal under consideration.
"No, it's not," he replied when asked if the pressure tactics would work. "My job is to analyze these hundreds of pieces of legislation and make my best judgment and be accountable for that. That's the job, and every four years, there's an election. I guess at the end of the day, I would submit, and I've got all these text messages — you know, 'I'm not voting for you again because of this vote,' or whatever — I would just submit to you that if you're going to vote or not going to vote for or against an individual based on their position on a complicated piece of comprehensive gambling legislation, and not look at the totality of work on education funding, projects, making sure we don't have our kids being indoctrinated by the radical left — if you're not going to look at the totality of the work, and instead you're going to base your whole vote, your whole vote for a senator or representative on whether or not they pass a comprehensive expansion of gambling bill, then maybe there's a gambling problem there you might want to think about. Is that not the very definition of a problem?"
He added that the feedback underscored the need to put something on the ballot that was right and would not hurt the state of Alabama.
Jeff Poor is the editor in chief of 1819 News and host of "The Jeff Poor Show," heard Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-noon on Mobile's FM Talk 106.5. To connect or comment, email jeff.poor@1819News.com or follow him on Twitter @jeff_poor.
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