BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — On the day before voters cast their votes in Alabama's roller-coaster Senate special election, Democrat Doug Jones is enlisting last-minute help from former President Barack Obama, while Republican Roy Moore is expected to emerge from hiding at a final-hour rally with Steve Bannon.

The anticipation surrounding the highest-profile special election in years grew with a surprise poll from Fox News showing Jones ahead by double-digits — defying a slew of other surveys that had Moore clinging to a narrow lead.


While Moore prepped for an evening rally with Bannon, the former White House chief strategist and right-wing provocateur, Jones’ campaign circulated robocalls from Obama and former Vice President Joe Biden.

The flurry of 11th-hour activity was a fitting conclusion to a race that has captivated the country, with the possibility of Democrats picking off a coveted Senate seat in deep-red territory against a Republican accused of preying on teenagers as a man in his 30s. The contest has exposed some painful rifts in the Republican Party that have yet to heal during Donald Trump's tenure in the White House.

But it has also raised questions about Democrats' ability to win over African-American voters without Obama on the ballot, especially in Southern states where tough voter ID laws already make such turnout operations difficult.

Speaking to reporters at Chris Z’s, a diner in Birmingham, on Monday, Jones dismissed the polling discrepancies and tried pivoting back to local matters by saying he cares for polls just as much as Nick Saban and Gus Malzahn, the coaches for the nationally-ranked University of Alabama and Auburn University football teams.

Still, Jones was careful not to confirm that Obama had recorded a supportive message for him, hyper-vigilant about appearing to accept support from such a controversial figure in such an overwhelmingly Republican state.

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“The only robo-call I know about for sure is the one from my wife,” he said.

Appearing at his first of three planned events Monday, Jones immediately reminded the press of comments made by Sen. Richard Shelby, the longtime Alabama Republican who reiterated on Sunday that he had written in a candidate rather than vote for Moore.

Jones’ campaign on Sunday quickly turned two clips of Shelby denouncing Moore into digital ads, and it kept a television spot featuring similar comments in rotation for the closing stretch. In order to win in a state that hasn’t elected a Democrat to the Senate since Shelby himself in 1992 — before he switched parties — Jones’ team is counting on conservatives turned off by Moore to either vote for him or write in a third option.

Pushing the write-in option, Democratic super PAC American Bridge on Sunday began targeting persuadable Republican voters with a digital ad urging them to back Saban. The editorial board of AL.com, a large newspaper group in the state, chipped in on Sunday as well, urging conservatives to follow Shelby's lead.

Moore, who disappeared from the campaign trail over the weekend to watch the Army-Navy football game in Philadelphia, according to Republicans close to his campaign, has spent the closing hours aiming to shore up his own support among the GOP base.

Declining to appear in public for days before Monday's rally — he even skipped church on Sunday — Moore instead stuck to friendly radio programs, while his allies bombarded local airwaves and screens with anti-Jones ads highlighting the Democrat's support for abortion rights and lashing him to the national party.

After Trump rallied for Moore just over the border in Pensacola, Fla. late last week, he also recorded a robo-call for the candidate. And joining the pro-Trump America First Action super PAC that has disclosed spending over $1 million for Moore this month, the Republican National Committee recently resumed its support for the candidate after earlier pulling out of a joint fundraising agreement with him.

Still, that move has not sat well with many Republicans aligned with the party establishment. In Monday, Nebraska RNC committeewoman Joyce Simmons resigned from the group.

“I strongly disagree with the recent RNC financial support directed to the Alabama Republican Party for use in the Roy Moore race. There is much I could say about this situation, but I will defer to this weekend’s comments by Senator Shelby,” she emailed fellow committee officials.

The move reflected one of Moore’s central challenges: winning over pro-Trump Republicans who remain skeptical of him.

Solution Fund, a pro-Moore super PAC, on Monday emailed supporters asking for a final financial push making specifically that pitch.

“Hundreds of thousand[s] of voters that voted last November to stop Hillary Clinton did not vote in the September Alabama Senate Primary,” the note read. “Our focus through election closing on Tuesday is to get these voters to polls."