U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) speaks to reporters as Republican lawmakers struggle to pass U.S. President Donald Trump’s sweeping spending and tax bill, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 28, 2025. REUTERS/Annabelle Gordon
Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) is under fire again about his Florida residency as he runs for governor in Alabama. While his campaign put out new documents to prove his residency, it inadvertently exposed him to two possible crimes.
For years, Tuberville has been plagued by allegations that he actually lived in Florida while running for office in Alabama. Now he's facing off against renewed allegations from Republican primary challenger Ken McFeeters. To prove he was an Alabama resident, his team recently produced seven years of tax documentation and property tax records. Still, there are questions as to how Tuberville can prove he was a resident of Alabama.
The question from Alabama Reporter journalist Josh Moon is why it took so long for Tuberville's staff to produce documentation in his defense.
"Then again," Moon wrote, "lots of things make no sense. And like those things, there is no quick answer. I’m certain we will discover many answers down the road, but for now, the best we can do is analyze what we’ve got."
Researchers are sifting through Tuberville's documents to prove authenticity and ensure that the taxes weren't refiled and paid retroactively. If they are accurate, McFeeters would be forced to prove that Tuberville never actually lived in his house.
If McFeeters wants to probe the Tubervilles on the three-bedroom, one-bath house and "under the rules established by the Alabama Republican Party," he can. "He, or his attorneys, can subpoena up to five people and question them for up to two hours each in an under-oath deposition" about the matter.
The larger mystery is about Tuberville's voting records and whether he committed voter fraud.
Tuberville included his 2018 tax filings in the tax records, which aren't required, since he only has to prove seven years of residency, not eight. The problem is that Tuberville voted in Florida in Nov. 2018 while claiming to be a resident of Alabama, AL.com reported.
"According to records from the Walton County, Florida, registrar’s office, Tuberville registered to vote in Florida on May 24, 2017, and voted by mail in the 2018 general election," Moon reported. "The earliest he could have received a mail-in ballot was October 2, 2018, according to the Division of Elections at the Florida Department of State."
Tuberville's wife and son also voted in Florida that year. Suzanne declared a homestead exemption for the Alabama house in October 2018. To get the exemption, you have to claim the house as your primary residence. Tuberville has been fighting over the issue because the homestead exemption wasn't on the Alabama House until 2024.
"That means there is now both a homestead exemption and a tax filing that shows the Tubervilles were Alabama residents when they voted in Florida, after swearing a year earlier that they were Florida residents," Moon wrote. "That seems … not good."
Tuberville has argued in favor of severe voter restrictions, alleging there is rampant voter fraud across the country.
It's not the only legal problem, however.
The Lagniappe Daily reported on Tuesday that McFeeter has questions about Tuberville's "reimbursements from his Senate office account and his various political action committees for food, transportation and flights to the Florida coast."
Tuberville's attorney called them "vacation escapes." The problem with that claim is that it's illegal to accept reimbursement from his official taxpayer-funded account for vacation travel. Rules for political action committees (PACs) are not as restrictive, but they still have to be tied to campaign purposes and using donations to fund his "vacation escapes" wouldn't be legal either.
McFeeters filed an ethics complaint about the matters already.
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