“Rumors and Rumblings” is a regular feature on Yellowhammer News. It is a compilation of the bits and pieces of information that we glean from conversations throughout the week.
Enjoy.
1. Beverly Hills flop. Los Angeles County has joined the ranks of out-of-state voices protesting the passage of Alabama’s new abortion law. The county’s Board of Supervisors recently sent Alabama Senate leader Del Marsh (R-Anniston) a letter notifying him of its disapproval of the law’s passage and conveying an empty promise of a one-year travel ban to the Yellowhammer State.
The letter, signed by all five members of the county’s governing body, says, “Alabama’s law is the most restrictive in the country…As a result, the County of Los Angeles has implemented a one-year travel restriction to the State of Alabama for official County business.”
This is not the first time Californians have expressed their disapproval of Alabama’s law.
Senator Kamala Harris (D-CA), a presidential hopeful from the Golden State, has said Alabama “couldn’t care less” about babies, while one second-tier Hollywood actress posed nude in anger over the bill.
A spokesman for Marsh informed Yellowhammer News that Marsh has now restricted official travel to Los Angeles County for those in his own office.
County of Los Angeles Letter to Del Marsh by Yellowhammer News on Scribd
2. Once upon a time in the West. Now that Roy Moore has announced his candidacy for another run at the U.S. Senate, the old stories that go along with years of scrutiny and research have quickly re-entered circulation among the political class. One story which dropped into our inbox yesterday has always been a favorite.
Following his failed bid for circuit judge in 1982, Moore went on a personal sojourn to Texas and then Australia for some very specific purposes. While in Texas, he trained to become a professional kickboxer. Moore told the Press-Register newspaper in 2000 that kickboxing was something he had always wanted to try. He said he trained hard, dropped weight, worked construction jobs to get by and spent time on the Texas coast.
And then Moore eventually made his way to Australia where he worked as a ranch hand on a large cattle property.
Two things have always struck us as odd — OK, particularly odd — about this part of Moore’s biography. First, is the fact that he went to the Lone Star State to kickbox and to the south Pacific to work as a cowboy. One would think it would have been the other way around. Secondly, it’s somewhat of a surprise that during none of his numerous campaigns for office did anyone delve more deeply into this chapter of his life, the people he met or the surroundings where he lived. Whether in opposition to Moore or in support of Moore, it’s possible there are some insightful stories to be told by the people with whom he fought and rode.
3. Restrain yourself. After Yellowhammer News wrote in last week’s Rumors and Rumblings about the moving target of being Donald Trump’s Alabama campaign “chairman,” former State Rep. Perry O. Hooper, Jr. is back in the national spotlight.
A Thursday Vice News article from the immediate aftermath of Moore’s announcement dubbed Hooper as “Trump’s Alabama campaign chairman.”
On Moore, he told the outlet, “I’m concerned. As much as I like Roy Moore, he’d have an extremely tough time beating Doug Jones. Right now we need to elect a Republican U.S. senator. I wish Roy would honor the wishes of the president.”
Now, to be clear, Hooper is state chair of Trump Victory — a fundraising entity separate from the president’s campaign itself.
In a statement to Yellowhammer News after he was quoted in Vice on Thursday, Hooper said, “It’s a free country. He has every right to run. I just wish Roy had honored the wishes of the President of the United States and not run.”
Expect national outlets to continue seeking out comments from Alabama representatives purportedly tied to Trump and party establishment figures. The circus is in town until at least March now, and outlets will be trying to one-up each other on the kind of headlines they can create, quotes they can land and “surrogates” they can utilize.
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