New York Post

I couldn’t take any Moore: ’bama sen.

- By MARISA SCHULTZ

Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby revealed on Sunday that he didn’t vote for fellow Republican Roy Moore because “the state of Alabama deserves better.”

Shelby said he had already cast his vote in the high-stakes special Senate election and wrote in another Republican rather than choose his party’s nominee, who is accused of abusing teen girls.

“I’d rather see the Republican win, but I’d rather see a Republican write-in. I couldn’t vote for Roy Moore. I didn’t vote for Roy Moore,” Shelby told CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Moore faces Democrat Doug Jones in Tuesday’s election to fill the seat vacated by US Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

Several women have claimed that Moore, 70, sought sexual relationsh­ips with them when he was an adult and they were teens. Among them is Leigh Corfman, who claims she was 14 when Moore fondled her in 1979.

“When it got to the 14-yearold’s story, that was enough for me,” Shelby said.

Moore has denied all allegation­s of sexual misconduct and has received President Trump’s endorsemen­t and the Republican National Committee’s support.

“These allegation­s are completely false,” Moore told “The Voice of Alabama Politics” TV show in an interview that aired Sunday. “I did not date underaged women. I did not molest anyone.”

If Moore wins Tuesday, the Sen- ate must decide whether to honor his election, according to Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins.

“If the allegation­s are known prior to the election, which they weren’t in the case of [Minnesota Sen.] Al Franken, for example, then we have a very tough decision to make about whether it’s our role as senators to overturn the will of the people,” Collins told CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

As Trump doubled down on his support for Moore, campaignin­g for him, three lawmakers resigned from Congress last week over allegation­s of sexual harassment.

Rep. Barbara Comstock, a Virginia Republican leading sexualhara­ssment reforms at the Capitol, said she was bothered by Trump’s support for Moore.

“It doesn’t represent me,” she told “Fox News Sunday.” “I don’t think it represents most of the Republican women, as well as my colleagues like Senator Tim Scott . . . and Cory Gardner.”

Jones spent the weekend campaignin­g, with an assist from Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey.

Moore, meanwhile, was on damage control Sunday after audio tapes surfaced of him talking about abolishing every amendment after the 10th.

“That would eliminate many problems,” he said. “You know people don’t understand how some of these amendments have completely tried to wreck the form of government that our forefather­s intended.”

Among those amendments are the 13th, which abolished slavery, and the 19th, which gave women the right to vote.

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