Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore just picked a fight with Jimmy Kimmel and lost.
This week, Kimmel sent his correspondent “Jake Byrd”—actually comedian Tony Barbieri—down south to disrupt a campaign rally Moore was holding at the Magnolia Springs Baptist Church just outside Mobile, Alabama. And when Moore found out that the heckler was secretly on Kimmel’s payroll, his campaign fired back via an “exclusive” Breitbart interview that didn’t bother to get Barbieri’s first name right.
“Jimmy Kimmel and the ‘Hollywood elite’ cross the line when they invade our Churches under a disguise and attempt to make a mockery of our worship services,” Drew Messer, a senior adviser to Moore, told Breitbart, before offering up what sounded a lot like a threat.
ADVERTISEMENT
“If Kimmel wants to mock our Christian values, he should come down here and do it man to man instead of hiding behind a camera in Hollywood,” Messer added. “And yes, Jimmy, we will still rebuild our military, build the wall, protect our gun rights, reform our tax code, and support President Trump whether you like that or not. Hollywood will not bully us around.”
After Moore posted a link to that article on Twitter, Kimmel himself responded, writing, “let me know when you get some Christian values and I’ll be there!”
But it was his next response that was even more pointed, directly referencing the numerous allegations that Moore preyed on underage girls.
Kimmel also shared footage of the incident that was captured by AL.com as a teaser for a longer field piece that will be part of Thursday night’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! show. In the footage, the Jake Byrd character can be seen wearing a shirt that says “Gimme Moore”—in the same way he wore a “DTF” hat at the Republican National Convention; he claimed it stood for “Donald Trump Forever.”
In the church, “Byrd” attempts to shout down actual protesters by calling Moore a “man’s man” and asking, “Does that look like the face of a molester to you?” as the candidate looks on awkwardly. Within a few seconds, he’s removed from the event by security.
