President Donald Trump isn’t planning to go to Alabama, but he still might use the weight of his office to help elect scandal-tarred Republican Senate candidate Roy Moore.

The White House is considering flooding the state with robo-calls, emails, and text messages in an offensive designed to activate the president’s supporters on Moore’s behalf, three people familiar with the discussions said. An administration-sanctioned super PAC, America First Action, is conducting polling in the state as it weighs a possible 11th-hour barrage.


Any White House-approved move would inject the president directly into a Senate race that is generating national headlines and become a focal point in a national conversation about sexual impropriety. Moore is confronting allegations that he sexually pursued teenage girls while in his 30s.

With the Dec. 12 special election fast approaching and polls showing a narrowing race, the Alabama contest is commanding the attention of Trump and top administration officials. The special election was a major topic of discussion during a Monday meeting between Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel, White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, and White House political director Bill Stepien, two people familiar with the gathering said.

During animated conversations with Republican senators over the last several weeks, the president has spoken in blunt terms about the race. He has doubted the accounts of Moore’s female accusers and questioned why they're emerging just weeks before the election despite the fact that Moore, a former state Supreme Court justice, has been in public life for nearly four decades.

Playbook PM Sign up for our must-read newsletter on what's driving the afternoon in Washington. Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Given Moore’s denials, Trump has argued, it makes little sense to cede a reliably Republican seat to Democrats.

The president has also expressed frustration that more pressure isn’t being put on Moore’s Democratic opponent, former U.S. Attorney Doug Jones. With so much coverage being paid to the Moore accusations, Jones has gotten an easy ride, Trump has vented. Last week, he gave White House counselor Kellyanne Conway personal approval to criticize Jones during an interview on “Fox and Friends.”

Trump aides caution that no decision has been made on whether to do more in Alabama. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders declined to comment on discussions within the White House.

Nor is there clarity on what the president’s message would be or how far he would go to back the Republican candidate. Before departing for his Mar-a-Lago resort last week, the president ripped Jones as “soft on crime.” In a Sunday tweet, the president added, "The last thing we need in Alabama and the U.S. Senate is a Schumer/Pelosi puppet who is WEAK on Crime, WEAK on the Border, Bad for our Military and our great Vets, Bad for our 2nd Amendment, AND WANTS TO RAISES TAXES TO THE SKY. Jones would be a disaster!"

Trump has been careful, however, not to explicitly praise or endorse Moore; White House advisers are deeply wary of full embrace of the candidate. If Trump opts to record robo calls or send emails to his vast support network in the state, he could continue that approach, attacking Jones but remaining mum on Moore.

The White House is consulting an array of polling numbers as it ponders its next move. It has been reviewing data from the Republican National Committee, which has been conducting voter analysis. Several administration officials said they had seen polling showing Jones, who once had a substantial lead, beginning to stagnate in recent days. Public surveys show a close race.

The White House has all but closed the door on a Trump visit to Alabama. During a press briefing on Monday, Sanders said the president “is not planning any trip to Alabama at this time, and, frankly, his schedule doesn’t permit him doing anything between now and Election Day.”

Yet afterwards, several Trump aides pointed to Sanders’ choice of words. Rather than rule out a trip, the press secretary merely said the president wasn’t currently “planning” a campaign stop for Moore. And instead of pointing to Moore’s personal problems to explain Trump’s likely absence, Huckabee attributed it to the president’s tight schedule.

Trump's 2016 campaign collected email addresses for thousands of supporters who attended his Alabama rallies, an expansive list that could be put to work in the special election. The president remains overwhelmingly popular in the conservative Deep South state.

Yet wading into the Alabama race could inflame tensions with Senate Republican leaders who have lined up against Moore. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has spoken with Trump about the race on multiple occasions over the last several weeks, has privately expressed dismay over the president’s skepticism toward Moore’s accusers. McConnell has told senior Republicans he wants to expel Moore if he wins.

Perhaps wary of crossing the Republican leader any further on the race, the president avoided discussing the election during a lunchtime appearance before the Senate GOP Conference on Tuesday. The closest that Trump came to the topic was when he lavished praise on Alabama Sen. Luther Strange — who lost the Republican primary to Moore — and asked the appointed senator to address his colleagues, said two people in attendance.