We predicted here three months ago -- based on the insights of opposition researcher and whistle blower Jill Simpson -- that U.S. Sen. Doug Jones (D-AL) would sell out the black, female, and progressive voters who put him in office. Josh Moon, of the Alabama Political Reporter (APR), now confirms that prediction was on target.
Moon's scathing report yesterday is particularly significant because the APR columnist has tended to write favorably about Jones -- something neither Simpson nor I ever will be accused of doing. In a post titled "Doug Jones is selling out the people who elected him," Moon not only rips Jones' voting record, but even suggests the junior senator will be a one-termer in D.C. From the Moon column:
It’s time for a reality check for Doug Jones.
You’re not going to be re-elected to the U.S. Senate.
Look, I’d love to think that there’s a chance, even a Lloyd Christmas “so you’re telling me there’s a chance” sort of chance. But there’s not.
You were nearly beaten by a man who was widely loathed in this state BEFORE he was accused of molesting a couple of teens and acting like a creepy uncle with several more. The worst candidate in modern political history nearly beat you because he had the good fortune of having an R beside his name and living in a state filled with people too ignorant to understand that a senator can’t affect abortion law at this point. (And please, spare the mock outrage over the late-term abortion ban bill that Jones voted against. That thing would’ve been declared unconstitutional by the next day by any federal court it landed in.)
So, when Del Marsh or some other Republican who didn’t allegedly molest teen girls lands on the ticket opposite you, you’re toast.
And it’s high time you started acting like it.
And stopped selling out the very people who put you in that office.
To whom does Jones owe his upset victory at the polls over Republican Roy Moore? Moon makes it clear, since Jones doesn't seem to be clear about it:
And it’s high time you started acting like it.
And stopped selling out the very people who put you in that office.
Without record support from the black community in Alabama (Jones’ numbers among black voters rivaled President Obama’s 2008 numbers), there’s zero chance that Jones is sitting in that office in D.C. today.
And without monumental efforts to get progressives out to the polls, ditto.
How has Jones rewarded those groups?
Moon answers that question by ripping Jones a new orifice for his vote, siding with Republicans, to roll back banking regulations:
By voting for a rollback of the Dodd-Frank banking regulations that were put in place to protect regular working folks from losing their 401ks and life savings in another financial crash, like the one that crippled America in 2008.
Included in the bill rolling back those protections was a particularly nasty, racist bit of language that will allow local banks to go back to the discriminatory lending practices of the past.
When the Dodd-Frank protections were passed a few years ago, they contained a little-known provision that required banks making mortgage loans to report additional info on borrowers they approved and denied. In addition to race and gender, the banks had to report income, credit scores, employment history and other factors that were considered in making the loans.
They did this because those banks, when accused of discriminatory lending practices, usually claimed that the denials of minority borrowers were related to those additional factors.
They weren’t denying black borrowers because they were black, the banks said, but because those black borrowers had lower credit scores, a sketchy employment history or were borrowing for homes in declining neighborhoods.
Well, guess what?
That wasn’t true.
Moon did some research that apparently Doug Jones was too lazy -- or too compromised by his cozy relationship with GOP thugs like Rob Riley -- to do:
A comprehensive report from the Center for Investigative Reporting, using the newly-required reporting info, found that minority applicants were 61 percent more likely to be denied a conventional home mortgage even when factors such as income, credit score and location were considered.
Mobile had the absolute worst score among metro markets, with black applicants 5.6 times less likely to be approved for a loan. In Montgomery, blacks were 3 times more likely to be denied.
Even with regulators watching, and with the possibility of fines and penalties, these banks went right ahead discriminating.
And now, thanks to Jones and 16 other Democrats, they can do it in the dark again.
It’s shameful.
What does that mean in everyday language? Moon spells it out:
No half-conscious person in Alabama doesn’t recognize the ramifications of this. Certainly not someone like Jones. He has to know Alabama’s long history of using discriminatory lending practices — especially at the community bank level — to prevent black families from moving into “breakaway” communities, and thus denying black children the ability to go to better schools.
In an op-ed that appeared in several Alabama newspapers, Jones defended his decision by saying that he wants to be more bipartisan and work across the aisle.
That’s a fine sentiment and all, but when the progressive voters of this state put Jones in office, their vision of him pushing bipartisanship was on bills that restored the rights of all people, that protected the least of us, that upheld the belief that all men are created equal.
Not a bill that ensures documented and provable discrimination will continue and flourish. Not a bill that makes it progressively harder for more Americans to achieve the American Dream. Not a bill that makes it easier for big banks to rob the working men and women — again.
Now seems like a good time to revisit Jill Simpson's words from our post dated Dec. 18, 2017:
What a hoot, I have never seen anything like this -- the Karl Rove, Tom Donohue, and Bill Canary Chamber of Commerce types claim they are staying out of the Moore/Jones race, when secretly they have all hands on deck helping Doug Jones. Doug is the Chamber of Commerce candidate in Alabama. Many progressives in Alabama have been viciously mistreated by the chamber, so that will not bode well for Doug. Many progressives have even been investigated by the chamber for working against Republicans, but by golly, the corporate guys are not helping Roy the Republican this time. Right now, it is all out war between Rove Republican elites -- Doug Jones is their guy -- and the Bannon Religious Right/White Republicans, and Roy Moore is their guy from the South and Heartland. . . .
The Rove Republicans behind the scenes are doing everything they can to help Doug Jones, and if he gets elected, he will owe them, just like they owe him for saving Rove from having to testify under oath -- by cooking the deal between the Riley/Sessions crowd and [Eric] Holder.
Jill Simpson predicted it, and Josh Moon has confirmed it: Alabamians might as well have sent Roy Moore to the Senate. His vote would have been the same as Doug Jones's on the Dodd-Frank rollback, which could put our economic security at risk.
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