Former ethics commissioner and Limestone County Probate Court Judge Stan McDonald is defending the legacy of Guy Hunt after State House Pro Tem Chris Pringle (R-Mobile) had some harsh words for the former Alabama governor last week, explaining why he opposed closed primaries.
"When he spoke to you, you didn't know what he was saying. His hair — they changed his hair. They taught him how to use a fork and a knife," Pringle said from the House floor about Hunt. "They taught him how to tie a tie. They made him into a candidate because the Democrats had screwed up so bad —they retaliated against the Democratic Party, and they elected Guy Hunt governor. And you don't think that won't happen?"
On Monday, McDonald, who also served as Hunt's deputy chief of staff, defended his former boss, saying he was a victim of a Democrat smear campaign starting in 1986.
"I don't like it when our good Republican leadership folks, which Chris is, borrow from old Democrat language and old Democrat rhetoric to give good sound debate on a respectable issue to consider. And when Guy Hunt became the apparent one to win the election in November of that year, the Democrats started a slander campaign against him. And candidly, Chris kind of repeated that. And it just proved out not to be true, the things that they were saying about him. It was in a heated campaign where they were trying to knock out all potential credibility," McDonald said on FM Talk 1065's "The Jeff Poor Show."
Though he later received a pardon, Hunt was forced to resign in 1993 after being found guilty of theft and ethical violations. McDonald argued that Hunt was innocent and that the charges and trial, as well as the Democrats' smear tactics during his campaign, haunted Hunt until he died in 2009.
"Chris is my friend… But, I got to stand up and protect the reputation and legacy of frankly one of the greatest Republican influences in the past hundred years," McDonald said. "And a lot of people, a lot of people — would I go so far as to say Chris Pringle? Yeah, I mean, I would. I go so far as to say even Chris Pringle, a lot of us owe a lot of what we've been able to do because of the pioneering, God-fearing, hard-charging spirit that Guy Hunt gave us as a gift in 1986. God bless his legacy. So I am going to step up and defend him."
He continued, "As a Republican, back when you couldn't get elected as a Republican in Cullman, Alabama, that's what kind of man he was. He was the first person who brought Ronald Reagan into Alabama when he was the governor of California, because he could tell and discern who and what he was."
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