Democratic Senate candidate Doug Jones faced a new challenge in the special election race against Republican Roy Moore after President Donald Trump publicly attacked his record on Tuesday, calling it “terrible.”
Before becoming U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, Jones used to serve as assistant U.S. attorney in Birmingham, Alabama with numerous high-profile convictions, which is all the more reason why it came as great surprise when Trump said he was “soft on crime.”
A campaign spokesman for Jones issued a statement in response to Trump’s comments, saying the many domestic terrorist “Doug locked up as U.S. attorney, including Tommy Blanton, a murderer who sits in prison now and will die there, would disagree that Doug is soft on crime. Officers, police chiefs and prosecutors heralded Doug for his toughness and persistence.”
Jones served as a federal prosecutor in Alabama for two decades and has been widely recognized for reopening a decades’ old bombing case against two Ku Klux Klan members. According to former Alabama state Supreme Court Justice Gorman Houston, a lot of people didn’t believe it could be done. He described Jones as “well-known and well-respected.”
“I would not say he was soft on crime. I don’t know where the president got that. His reputation was not being soft on crime. I have just never heard that,” Houston said.
Pam Pierson, a law professor at the University of Alabama, joined Houston in her praise of Jones, whose decision to reopen the case, she said, took a lot of courage other prosecutors may lack.
Pierson urged Trump to reexamine Jones’ record more closely as it clearly indicates he was never soft on crime.
Others also stood in defense of Jones, like Spencer B. Walker who is currently the district attorney in the 1st Judicial Circuit of Alabama. He wrote that Jones’ “professional reputation is that he is a fair but tough prosecutor who excelled at his job.”
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