After Democrat Doug Jones narrowly beat out Republican Roy Moore in the race for Alabama’s open Senate seat, President Donald Trump took to Twitter to grudgingly offer his congratulations.
“Congratulations to Doug Jones on a hard fought victory,” Trump tweeted after Jones was declared the winner of the close race.”The write-in votes played a very big factor, but a win is a win.”
It’s true that the write-in vote percentage did play a role in the election, as the percentage of people who wrote in a candidate other than Jones or Moore was 1.7 percent. That’s higher than the percentage gap between the votes Jones won and the votes Moore won.
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Trump did add a caveat to his congratulations, though, noting that Jones would not be in the seat long before the seat was up for grabs again: “The people of Alabama are great, and the Republicans will have another shot at this seat in a very short period of time. It never ends!”
Moore’s loss comes as a blow to Trump, who had actively thrown his support behind the Senate candidate despite the fact that Moore was accused of sexual misconduct by several women who claimed that he had dated and molested them while they were underage.
Congratulations to Doug Jones on a hard fought victory. The write-in votes played a very big factor, but a win is a win. The people of Alabama are great, and the Republicans will have another shot at this seat in a very short period of time. It never ends!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 13, 2017