Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.
* Though it seems hard to believe, a new Fox News poll out of Alabama shows Doug Jones (D) leading Roy Moore (R) by 10 points, 50% to 40%. A couple of other new polls, meanwhile, show Moore up by about five points.
* Donald Trump has dropped all pretenses and has decided to campaign on Moore’s behalf, including recording a new robocall in support of the right-wing candidate.
* On a related note, Barack Obama and Joe Biden have reportedly both recorded robocalls on Jones’ behalf.
* On the last weekend before Alabama’s election, Moore held no public events, and apparently wasn’t even in the state on Saturday, choosing instead to go to the Army-Navy football game in Philadelphia.
* Former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (D) has kept a relatively low profile in recent months, but he was in Alabama over the weekend, campaigning alongside Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) in the hopes of boosting Jones’ support with African-American voters. * Joyce Simmons, a Republican National Committee member from Nebraska, resigned from the RNC this morning, citing the party’s official support for Roy Moore’s campaign. * Because time is a flat circle, at Trump’s rally near the Florida-Alabama border on Friday night, he paused and smiled when some of his audience chanted, “Lock her up” in response to a reference to Hillary Clinton. * In Michigan, Gov. Rick Snyder (R) announced Friday that the special election to fill John Conyers’ congressional vacancy won’t be until November 2018. In Arizona, meanwhile, Gov. Doug Ducey (R) set a special election date of April 24 to fill Trent Franks’ vacancy, with primaries to be held on Feb. 27.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past." Recommended
