"For years, Tuberville has struggled to convince everybody he was a bona fide Alabama 'resident citizen,'" Whitmire wrote. "Alabama law requires candidates for governor to have lived in the state for the last seven years. The evidence didn’t seem to be on his side."
Tuberville, for nearly two decades, owned a 4,000-square-foot beach house worth at least $4 million on Florida's Gulf Coast but purchased a much smaller home in Auburn, Alabama, in 2017 that he claimed as his primary residence while running for Senate, and he later sold that house in 2023.
"[That] three-bedroom, one-bathroom Auburn house ... has been appraised at about $300,000, less than a tenth of what the Florida beach house is worth. But this is what Tuberville said was his residence," Whitmire wrote. "As a U.S. senator, Tuberville has used campaign funds and taxpayer dollars to fly to Florida often — to dine in its restaurants and to travel by car. As much as, if not more than, he does such things in Alabama."
The columnist said he challenged Tuberville last year to show his tax returns to prove he lived in Alabama, and his GOP primary opponent Ken McFeeters pledged to drop out of the race and donate to the senator's campaign if he showed those returns.
"The Alabama Republican Party [this week] allowed McFeeters to move forward with a party election challenge — a decision that will give McFeeters the power to subpoena five witnesses for two hours of testimony under oath, and to issue up to five subpoenas for records," Whitmire wrote. "Suddenly, after more than a year of ignoring the issue and scoffing at those who raised it, Tuberville’s campaign turned over seven years of Alabama tax returns. Those records appear to show that Tuberville moved his residency back to Alabama in August 2018 and that he has kept it there, at least as far as the tax man is concerned."
However, Florida election records tell another story.
"The tax records show that Tuberville moved to the Auburn house that August," Whitmire wrote. "But Florida election records show he and his wife, Suzanne, voted in Florida that November, three months after the income taxes say he became an Alabama resident. That’s also after the homestead exemption."
State law requires Senate candidates to live in Alabama for only a day, but gubernatorial candidates must reside there for at least seven years, and Tuberville's voting record suggests he hasn't.
"This is the Tommy Tuberville who stood on the Senate floor this year and demanded the country pass the SAVE Act, the bill to require proof of citizenship to register and a photo ID to vote, to stop people from voting where they’re not supposed to," Whitmire wrote. "In 2018, his vote did count — only in a state where he says his taxes show he no longer lived as a 'resident citizen.'"
Observers were stunned by the revelations.
"Bless his heart," sighed Joyce Vance, a former federal prosecutor in Alabama.
"Every accusation is a confession," noted Georgia State political scientist Jeff Lazarus.
"Lock him up…lock him up…lock him up…," chanted software developer Greg Ostravich. "Their voter fraud hysteria is always projection. Always. He’s not the only one. Anne Coulter did this too and other legislators besides Tuberville."
"Very much looking forward to witnessing how Alabama election officials figure out the ultimate excuse to keep Tuberville on the ballot," opined political operative Joel Mendelson.
