Before boarding Marine One outside the White House on Wednesday afternoon, President Donald Trump was asked by a reporter to react to Tommy Tuberville winning Alabama’s Republican U.S. Senate nomination.
Trump had endorsed Tuberville in the GOP runoff and reacted to the impressive victory on Tuesday night in a tweet right after the race was called.
Speaking to the White House press pool on Wednesday, Trump said, “I’m very happy that Tommy Tuberville won the race. I think he’s going to be a great senator.”
The president then criticized U.S. Senator Doug Jones (D-AL), who Trump the previous day called a “Super Liberal puppet” for Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).
RELATED: Jones: Representing the majority of Alabamians not ‘the be all to end all’ (VIDEO)
“We don’t have a good senator there right now in Jones,” Trump lamented. “He’s not doing the job. He should be doing a much better job. Certainly he doesn’t represent the views of the people of Alabama — that’s for sure. So we’re not happy about him at all. I don’t think the people of Alabama are happy with their representation in the Senate.”
“And Tommy Tuberville is going to be a great senator. He was a great coach. I spoke to another coach last night — unrelated — and he said, ‘Tommy Tuberville was a great coach and he’s a great guy.’ Someday I’ll tell you who said that, but he’s somebody respected,” the president continued.
“So it was a great — it was a tremendous win for Tommy Tuberville last night. I’m very happy about it,” Trump concluded.
Watch:
Trump says he’s “very happy” that ex-college football coach Tommy Tuberville beat former U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions in Alabama’s GOP Senate runoff on Tuesday pic.twitter.com/DlKkB3d8hV
— Bloomberg QuickTake (@QuickTake) July 15, 2020
Tuberville and Jones will face each other at the ballot box in November’s general election, when Trump will also be up for reelection.
Sean Ross is the editor of Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @sean_yhn
