Learn the true politics of every coach first.
As a college football coach, Tommy Tuberville had a successful career.
As a US Senator, Tommy Tuberville has successfully maintained his allegiance to Republican talking points, patterns of behavior and ideology.
Since he’s been in office, we’ve witnessed how the freshman Alabama senator managed to hide his racist nature for over three decades as a collegiate coach and won his current position by never revealing it until election time.
Now he’s unleashed it for all to see.
Politics As Usual
Three weeks ago, during an interview with NPR affiliate WBHM, Tuberville showed his true self when he vilified Democrats by accusing the party of weakening the military by wanting to purge hate from its ranks.
“We are losing in the military so fast. Our readiness in terms of recruitment,” Tuberville said, according to the station’s transcript of the May 4 interview. “And why? I’ll tell you why. Because the Democrats are attacking our military, saying we need to get out the white extremists, the white nationalists, people that don’t believe in our agenda.”
Tuberville’s “people that don’t believe in our agenda” is an interesting choice of words.
Pressed on whether white nationalists should be allowed to serve in the U.S. military, Tuberville doubled down.
“Well, they call them that. I call them Americans.”
Afterward, Tuberville was scorched. While attempting to clarify his comments, Tuberville further exposed himself.
“Democrats portray all Trump people as white nationalists. That’s what I was saying,” said Tuberville. “There’s a lot of good people that are Trump supporters that for some reason my Democratic colleagues want to portray as white nationalists. That’s not true.”
His wordplay can’t deflect the fact that he wouldn’t denounce white nationalists serving in the military. Instead, he characterized them as Americans and jumped to the defense of the former president.
Here’s why that’s absolutely preposterous.
As a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Tuberville proudly extolls the following on his Senate committee assignment page:
The work of this committee is critical to ensuring our military has the resources it needs to protect our country against current and future threats, and it’s our responsibility to give our servicemen and women the support they deserve to ensure our military remains the greatest fighting force in the world.
Ok, but this is the same man who is currently denying the military the resources it needs by holding up Senate approval of almost 650 senior officers due to the Pentagon’s abortion policy, which provides travel funds and support for troops and dependents seeking abortions but who are based in states that prohibit the service.
This holdup, said Army Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is “unsettling for the institution” and will cause the military to be weakened over time.
Tuberville’s experience in playing games on Saturday afternoons in the fall is obviously coming in handy on the Senate floor.
And this isn’t Tuberville’s first coordinated political game plan.
Continue reading over at First and Pen.
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