Roy Moore Denies He's a Pedophile, Again Trashes Trans People

Anti-LGBT U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore of Alabama emerged for a rare campaign speech Monday night, again denying allegations that he engaged in sexual misconduct with teenage girls and saying these "false attacks" were concocted to distract from the "true issues," such as transgender rights.

"The people of this country want movement. They don't want false attacks like this. That's exactly what's happening in this case," Moore said at a rally in the small northeast Alabama town of Henagar, covered by local media including AL.com, a website for several Alabama newspapers, and Huntsville TV station KHNT. "They want to hide the true issues of immigration and health care, military readiness, taxes, abortion, and transgender rights. They also not only want to hide the issues, they don't want my opponent's issues revealed; how he stands on these issues. I'll tell you how he stands: completely contrary to the people of this state and this country."

Moore, the far-right former chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, is the Republican candidate running against Democrat Doug Jones in a December 12 special election to fill the vacancy left by Jeff Sessions when he became U.S. attorney general. Moore bested the interim senator, Luther Strange, in the Republican primary.

Moore denounced Jones for opposing Donald Trump's attempt to reinstate the ban on military service by transgender people, an attempt currently blocked by federal courts.

"I know how to strengthen the military, and it isn't by putting transgender troops and opposing President Trump's ban on transgender troops in the military," Moore said. "I oppose transgender rights. There is no right to believe you're a person of the opposite sex or opposite gender, and when you start preserving rights like that -- that you can be who you want. There's a new word called fluid transgenderism. That means you can go back and forth. ... There's a big difference. There's a big difference between myself and my opponent."

Moore has previously said transgender people are mentally ill and have no legal rights. He made his name in Alabama for opposition to LGBT rights in general, especially marriage equality. He even claimed the state didn't have to abide by the U.S. Supreme Court's 2015 ruling that gave same-sex couples the right to marry in every state. This stand got him removed from the state Supreme Court for ethics violations. He had been removed once before, for disobeying a court order to take down a Ten Commandments monument at the state courthouse, which a federal judge had declared an unconstitutional establishment of religion.

Moore said he does not know any of the women making the sexual misconduct allegations, which date from the late 1970s and early 1980s, and include touching a 14-year-old girl in a sexual manner and sexually assaulting a 16-year-old. He said he has never engaged in such conduct with anyone and has represented victims of sexual abuse in court.

He further said the accusations are "malicious, false attacks, which reflect the immorality of our time" and likened them to the probe of Russian meddling in the presidential election.

"Why are they doing this?" he said. "I'm going to tell you why they are doing this. They are trying to hide the true issues which affect the people of this country and this state that they want resolved. It's no different than when The Washington Post brought out the Russia investigation at a time when President Trump is trying to get his agenda passed. That's exactly what they are doing. They are taking the attention away and they're not getting anything they are doing. They are taking attention away from the Senate and from the Congress, who can't pass legislation."

He blamed the so-called Washington establishment for the allegations. "There is an established group in Washington that does not want to change," he said. They want people who will follow along like they've been doing and not basically pass President Trump's agenda," Moore said.

Trump actually endorsed Strange, the similarly conservative but more "establishment" candidate, in the primary. Since then, he has regularly denounced Jones and cited Moore's denial of the sexual misconduct allegations, while stopping just short of endorsing Moore.

Moore received several standing ovations for the speech, according to local media. He did not take questions from the press. Watch video below.