State Sen. Jay Hovey (R-Auburn) said on Tuesday that “people are going to try to politicize” the Dadeville shooting, but “we’re never going to be able to legislate morality.”
It's now official. Auburn City Councilman Jay Hovey has pulled off the biggest upset of the primary cycle in unseating three-term incumbent State Sen. Tom Whatley (R-Auburn) despite being outspent 12-to-1.
Friday's decision by the ALGOP finally makes Jay Hovey the winner of the May 24 Republican primary and the party's nominee. The committee made the decision not to count the disputed provisional ballot that it previously had counted after ALEA produced evidence that that voter was not lawfully registereed.
Friday, just before the Alabama Republican Party's steering committee was set to reconvene to consider the disputed Senate District 27 Republican primary contest outcome between State Sen. Tom Whatley (R-Auburn) and Auburn City Councilman Jay Hovey, Whatley formally announced he was dropping his challenge.
During an appearance on "Rightside Radio" broadcasted on Huntsville's WVNN on Thursday, Bryan Taylor, legal counsel for Patsy Kenney, the so-called non-registered voter in the disputed Senate District 27 outcome, said his client was considering legal action if her vote winds up being rejected.
The Alabama Republican Party has granted a motion for a rehearing of Saturday's election contest in State Senate District 27. The motion was granted based on new evidence from ALEA about a disputed ballot. The committee on Saturday declared the race between Sen. Tom Whatley and Jay Hovey a tie. Hovey won the race by one vote, according to election results certified by local election officials.
The Alabama Republican Party Candidate Committee voted to declare the outcome of Senate District 27, between Tom Whaley and Jay Hovey, at tie. It will likely be decided by a coin toss.
State Sen. Whatley criticized a New York Times op-ed and claimed 422 voters who participated in "multiple" Democratic primaries voted in last month's SD27 Republican Party primary.
In an op-ed published in Monday's edition of The New York Times, Auburn University creative writing professor Anton DiSclafani took credit for State Sen. Tom Whatley's single-vote loss.
In a statement given to 1819 News on Tuesday, Sen. Tom Whatley's (R-Auburn) legal team explained the decision not to pursue a recount and to put Senate District 27 challenge in the hands of GOP officials "to ensure that all Republican votes are counted."
The Alabama Republican Party will hear four election contests from the May 24 Republican primary. These are state senate district 27, and state house districts 2, 28, and 29.
Political watchers figured the contest for the Republican nomination in State Senate District 27 to be competitive, but as it stands now, it will be one of the more bizarre state senate contests in Alabama political history.