Is The Fix Already In for Jared Hudson?

Monday, June 15 at 2:22 PM EDT, Fox News posted a story on their website:

“Former Navy SEAL Jared Hudson defeats Trump-backed Barry Moore in Alabama Senate runoff election”

The story covers Alabama’s Senate runoff, and how President Trump’s endorsement of Congressman Moore wasn’t enough to win over political newcomer Hudson. Pretty standard stuff for Fox, nothing really unusual about the contents of the story.

Except…the election hadn’t happened yet.

Needless to say, red flags went up, and the story came down 20 minutes later.

Unfortunately for Fox, downloads and screenshots are forever, and h/t to 1819 News, they pulled the web page as a PDF and saved it. You can read it on their site HERE.

It wasn’t just 1819 that noticed, either. iHeart and MSN also picked it up before it was yanked down.

So, here’s the question: was this just an Oopsie moment by some over-eager staffer, posting a pre-prepared draft of a story that was written “just in case” it might be needed?

Or does Fox News know something we don’t?

It’s possible this was just an Oopsie. Stories like this are often pre-written, to save time. Either Jared or Barry is going to win, period. Election night is going to be frantically busy. Why not do basic prep work both ways so all you have to do on election night is pull up the correct draft, add a few details, and push the button? I’ve done this myself on numerous occasions. As a writer, it makes you look really good to other staffers when you “finish” the press release five minutes after the speech is done.

Pro tip: if you’re the Speech Writer and the Press Release Writer, this is almost too easy — you know what the best quotes are going to be, because you wrote them.

I’m not saying this is what happened in this case. I wasn’t there. I will say that there are usually safeguards in place to prevent it from happening. It should not have happened under normal circumstances. So, if it happened that way, it was a MASSIVE screwup on somebody’s part.

There is, of course, another possibility.

Did someone at Fox get advance knowledge of how the Senate runoff was going to come out before the actual voting took place?

Yes, yes; I can already hear you screaming. “Alabama’s elections are the gold standard!” That’s a real popular one, right up there with “the vaccines are safe and effective.” “We can trust our machines!” is another — except there are far too many Alabamians who’ve gone to the same meetings I have these last several years, where we’ve heard from local and national experts about just how vulnerable and untrustworthy our voting machines really are.

Photocopied ballots in Lee County, anyone?

I’ve met Dr. Douglas Frank, and I’ve heard him say “give me the numbers for one County, and I’ll tell you how every County in the State voted.” In case you’re wondering who Dr. Frank is, I’ve put a few of his videos he’s done here in Alabama at the end of this piece, so you can listen to him for yourself.

I also remember 2022, when suddenly Kay Ivey miraculously avoided a runoff with either Tim James or Lindy Blanchard, when both of their internal polling showed MeeMaw with only 40-ish percent support just before the primary. 

There were another couple of races in that primary, too, that were “won” by the same statistical percentage as MeeMaw’s. I was told that by people who math much better than I, and I think they were telling me the truth.

I also remember Hanes et. al. v. Merrill et. al., and the circumstances around its filing and ultimate dismissal for lack of standing. The concerns it raised are just as valid now as they were in 2022 when it was filed.

And for those of you who still don’t think an election can be rigged, let me just give you two more examples:

• Fulton County, GA in 2020
• Los Angeles, CA Mayoral primary two weeks ago (and still counting!)

I’ve been known to quip that “This is Alabama, where the person who gets the most votes isn’t necessarily the person who had the most people vote for them.” It’s been that way for longer than I’ve been alive — there are documented occurrences early in the last century of Sheriff’s deputies standing over ballot boxes with shotguns to make sure the “wrong people” didn’t put their ballots in.

Is that what’s going to happen today in the Senate runoff? Not the deputies with shotguns, but the electronic equivalent? I certainly hope not, but I’m concerned it might. 

That race, and a couple more in this runoff, have reached new highs in low-down behaviors by their campaigns. Even by our Alabama standards — “politics as blood sport” — this one has been one for the history books. 

Consider this: with all the money that’s poured in, all the lies and half-truths that have been told, all the mudslinging that’s gone on? There are some desperate campaigns out there who’ve already stooped to truly despicable tactics.

Is rigging an election beyond them? Or beyond their backers, the source(s) of all that out-of-state money? And if they’re going to rig one, why not rig a few more, while they’re at it?

I can’t say conclusively that it couldn't happen. That bothers me.

What bothers me more is that if it’s brought up after the election, it’ll be brushed off with the usual “good standard” platitudes.

If Barry wins the runoff, then Fox looks a little more foolish, and all my worries will have been for naught.

But if Jared wins, after this Fox Oopsie? There will always be that nagging suspicion in the minds of some.

Will it stop Jared from becoming our next Senator? Not at all. Long-term, will it affect his future career? I doubt it. The public has a short memory, and this will fade just like the memory of Hanes v Merrill.

But what it will do is start his campaign for the general election in November with a stain of uncertainty, a little smear of doubt. Nothing that’ll stop him from squishing the Democrat nominee like a bug, but still….

Maybe after November, we can try having that “paper ballots, hand counted” discussion again.

But I doubt that, too.

Dr. Bill Chitwood is the Managing Editor of ALPolitics.com. He is the author, under his nom de guerre Doc Contrarian, of Beyond MAGA: From Trump campaign slogan to political movement to restoring the Republic. He identifies as Conservatarian Contrarian and a staunch Constitutional Originalist. He enjoys being called a First Amendment Nazi — mainly because he is.

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