December 5, 2017

Republicans Decide Roy Moore Is a Good Republican. He Is.

Richard B. Levine/Levine Roberts/Newscom via ZUMA

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Until today, Republicans could say that, officially at least, they have repudiated Roy Moore’s noxious behavior.¹ Not anymore:

President Trump on Monday strongly endorsed Roy S. Moore, the Republican nominee for a United States Senate seat here, prompting the Republican National Committee to restore its support for a candidate accused of sexual misconduct against teenage girls.

….Mr. Trump’s endorsement and the party’s reversal hours later came a day after Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, had stepped back from his earlier criticism of Mr. Moore, saying Alabama voters should “make the call” on whether to send Mr. Moore to the Senate. Taken together, the week’s developments suggested that Republicans were increasingly confident that Mr. Moore is well positioned to defeat Doug Jones, the Democratic nominee, in next week’s special election.

This is the most depraved conduct possible from the Republican Party. They could have stood by Moore from the start, saying that the charges against him weren’t credible. Alternatively, they could have publicly denounced Moore but continued to hope in their hearts that he won.

But no. They publicly accepted that the charges against Moore were credible. They agreed that this made him unfit for office. But then, when it looked like he might win, they turned around and decided to support him anyway. And this all came on the same day that Moore said this about Jewish philanthropist George Soros:

Speaking about financial bubbles, John Maynard Keynes once said “the markets can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.” Right now, we seem to be stuck in a sort of Republican immorality bubble, and it’s already continued its surge for far longer than I would have imagined possible. But it won’t last forever. Someday the Republican Party is going to pay a price for its stunning lack of a moral compass.

¹Which, just for the record, goes far beyond molesting teenage girls.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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