RNC pulls out of fundraising agreement with Roy Moore campaign
The Republican National Committee has pulled out of the joint fundraising agreement with Alabama Republican Roy Moore's campaign, according to Federal Election Commission paperwork filed Tuesday.
The move comes amid growing pressure for the Republican Party to ditch the candidate accused of sexually touching minors.
The RNC is no longer listed as an entity in the joint fundraising agreement with Moore's campaign and the Alabama Republican Party. The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) already backed out of the agreement last week, and there had been calls for the RNC to to the same. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, has called on Moore to drop out, as has Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin. NRSC Chairman Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colorado, has said the party should expel Moore from the Senate if he is elected.
The GOP is severing financial ties with Moore after allegations from five women that Moore inappropriately pursued them when they were teens and he was in his 30s, including two women who claim Moore sexually touched them against their wishes. The allegations have rocked Capitol Hill, with Republicans scrambling to decide what to do next. The special election race against Democrat Doug Jones is less than one month away on Dec. 12.
On Tuesday, Jones' campaign released a new ad in which some self-proclaimed Republicans say they will be voting for Jones over Moore, implying their lost faith in the Republican candidate amid the allegations.
"You read the story and it just shakes you," says one voter, in what appears to be interpreted as the original Washington Post story accusing Moore of sexually touching a 14-year-old girl when he was 32.
Moore has called the allegations fake news, and his campaign has continued fundraising in the wake of the women's accusations.
The good people of Alabama, not the Washington elite who wallow in the swamp, will decide this election! #DitchMitch
— Judge Roy Moore (@MooreSenate) November 14, 2017
Moore will make his first major appearance since the allegations Tuesday night, addressing an audience at the God Save America Conference in Jackson, Alabama.