Jeff Sessions Concedes Republican Primary Bid For Alabama's Senate Seat To Newcomer Tommy Tuberville

Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions conceded the Alabama primary race for his old Senate seat, pledging to support his rival, political newcomer Tommy Tuberville, the former football coach of Auburn University.

Tuberville won the runoff with 60.7% of the vote to Sessions’ 39.3%.

“I leave elected office with my integrity intact. I hold my head high,” Sessions said during his concession speech, congratulating Tuberville in the process. “He is our Republican nominee. “We must stand behind him in November.”

Tuberville thanked Sessions for the show of support.

“Being a football coach, I know when you get into a bowl game and you lose, one team moves on and the other one doesn't,” Tuberville said. “But you're in the same conference, but you pull for each other, even after that.”

President Donald Trump, who endorsed Tuberville’s bid as the Republican nominee, tweeted his happiness at the outcome as well. He also took the chance to attack sitting Alabama Sen. Doug Jones, a Democrat.

Trump hadn’t been shy about attacking Sessions in the past due, irked by the former attorney general's decision to recuse himself from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference during the 2016 presidential election. Trump repeatedly called Sessions a “disaster” during the latter’s campaign to regain the Senate seat he held for 20 years before joining the Trump administration. Sessions, however, brushed off Trump’s attacks.

“I know that he has his strong feelings about this race,” Sessions said. “I know he's upset about the long, prolonged investigation that really disrupted his life and, in many ways, made it hard for him to govern effectively.”

“I leave with no regrets. And I was honored to serve the people of Alabama in the Senate, and I was extraordinarily proud of the accomplishments we had as attorney general.”

Tuberville will face Jones in November in a race some analysts and strategists say he can win. Jones narrowly beat Republican Roy Moore for the seat during a special election in 2017 to replace Sessions.

“The outsider is now who has the upper hand in every race these days,” political strategist David Mowery told NBC News. “It's hard to turn that into a negative in 2020 Republican primaries.”