Basketball Hall of Famer Charles Barkley celebrated Democrat Doug Jones’s victory in the Alabama special Senate election Tuesday night, while also urging Democrats to follow through on their promises to black voters.
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“I’m so proud of my state. I love my state. We got some amazing people here. Yeah, we got a bunch of rednecks and a bunch of ignorant people, but we got some amazing people here and they rose up today,” Barkley said on CNN.
Barkley also took the moment to criticize Democrats, saying they’ve taken support from black voters and poor voters for granted “for a long time” and expressed hope the party would take action to benefit those groups.
“It’s time for them to get off their ass and start making life better for black folks and people who are poor,” Barkley said.
The Associated Press called the election for Jones over Republican Roy Moore shortly before 10:30 p.m. EST. It is the first time in 25 years that Alabama has elected a Democrat to the Senate.
Barkley, an Alabama native who played basketball at Auburn University, appeared on the campaign trail with Jones on Monday night.
Barkley previously criticized Moore as a “white separatist.”
“Roy Moore was an embarrassment,” Barkley said Tuesday night. “Hey listen, if any other man had eight women accusing him of sexual harassment, talking about how he really enjoyed slavery, he thinks people who are homosexual should go to jail, they wouldn’t have even been in this election.”