Alabama GOP Rep. Mo Brooks hints at likely Senate run with campaign event featuring former Trump advisor Stephen Miller
- Rep. Mo Brooks is hosting a campaign event that will feature former Trump advisor Stephen Miller.
- Brooks, of Alabama, is expected to run for Senate to replace retiring Sen. Richard Shelby.
- Trump is expected to get involved in the 2022 primaries to boost his allies.
Alabama GOP Rep. Mo Brooks teased a likely Senate run with a campaign event next week that will be attended by Stephen Miller, a top aide to former President Donald Trump.
According to an invitation posted on Brook's Twitter page, the pair will attend his "campaign rally and announcement" at Bullet & Barrel, an indoor shooting range and training facility in Huntsville, Alabama, on March 22.
Brooks' campaign did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
Brooks, a staunch conservative, was one of the leading lawmakers behind the effort to challenge slates of Electoral College votes from states that voted for President Joe Biden at the joint session of Congress on January 6, the day that pro-Trump rioters sieged the US Capitol.
In the weeks leading up to the electoral vote count, Brooks pushed false assertions of massive voter fraud and election irregularities in six swing states that voted for Biden. He also claimed, without evidence, that "honest America[n] citizens have been victims of the largest voter fraud and election theft scheme in American history."
Brooks is now expected to jump into the race to replace Sen. Richard Shelby, who is not running for reelection. Brooks recently told CNN that he is considering running for Senate. Asked about Trump's support, he said: "I think that's for him to announce at the appropriate time."
Shelby, who represented Alabama in the Senate since 1986, developed a reputation as a highly-skilled legislator who routinely secured major federal resources for Alabama from his post on the Appropriations Committee.
He is one of several longtime Republican senators to opt out of running for reelection in 2022, along with Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, Roy Blunt of Missouri, and Rob Portman of Ohio.
The Republican primaries to replace all five senators will test the extent of Trump's continued influence over the GOP. Trump reportedly plans on getting involved in the 2022 primaries both to boost candidates he sees as allies and to undermine Republicans he sees as disloyal to him, including Sen. Lisa Murkowski - who voted to convict him in his most recent impeachment trial.
Another Republican Senate candidate in Alabama, Trump's former ambassador to Slovenia, Lynda Blanchard, recently hosted a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago, Trump's club and current residence in Palm Beach, Florida. She did not receive his endorsement.
For his part, Miller was both one of Trump's speechwriters and a leading architect of the hardline immigration policy under Trump's administration, including the highly-controversial family separation policy at the US-Mexico border in 2018.
Before joining the Trump administration, Miller was an immigration policy advisor to former Sen. Jeff Sessions, who represented Alabama in the US Senate for decades before serving as Trump's attorney general. Sessions attempted to run for his old seat in 2020, but lost the Republican primary to now-Sen. Tommy Tuberville.