Phillip Jauregui: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know

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Roy Moore’s attorney, Phillip Jauregui, held a press conference about the sexual assault and misconduct accusations against the Republican who is running for the U.S. Senate in Alabama.

Jauregui was Moore’s attorney in both legal battles that led to him being removed from his seat as the chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court.

Two women have accused Moore of sexually assaulting them when they were teens, and others have come forward with claims that he acted inappropriately told them when they were young. Reports have also uncovered that rumors have long spread around Moore’s hometown of Gadsden about his behavior when he was in his late 20s and early 30s and working as a district attorney. According to the New Yorker, locals said Moore was banned from the Gadsden Mall because of the way he acted with teen girls.

Moore, 70, has denied all the allegations made against him and has said they are the result of a conspiracy by Democrats, including his opponent, Doug Jones, the liberal media and establishment Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who is among several high-ranking GOP leaders that have called for Moore to drop out of the race. Moore’s campaign chairman Bill Armistead said at Wednesday’s press conference that the former judge has been “falsely accused of some things that he did not do 40 years ago.”

“This is a campaign, so you can expect most anything to come out, but you know we can’t just stand by idly and let false charges go without some answering,” Armistead told reporters. “We’ve had a lot of people tell us different things about some of these stories and we’re checking them all out.”

Here’s what you need to know:


1. Jauregui Has Asked for One of the Accusers to Turn Over a Yearbook She Says Was Signed by Moore

Phillip Jauregui spoke to the press in an effort to raise questions about the most recent accusation made against Roy Moore. Beverly Young Nelson spoke out at a press conference Monday with her attorney, Gloria Allred, and accused Moore of harassing and sexually assaulting her when she was 15 and 16 and he was the 30-year-old Etowah County District Attorney.

Jauregui told reporters that Nelson and Allred said at the press conference that Nelson had never seen nor had any contact with Moore. But, according to Jauregui Nelson filed for divorce against her husband in 1995 in Etowah County and Moore, then a local judge, was assigned the case.

He also called into question a yearbook that Nelson said had been signed by Moore. Jauregui said Moore did not sign the yearbook, and said they have a handwriting expert analyzing the signature and what was written. Jauregui said they are “demanding” that the original yearbook be released so the handwriting can be analyzed.

“We can find out if it is genuine or a fraud,” Jauregui said.

Jaurgeui also said that Nelson claimed that Moore wrote “DA” after his name because he was the district attorney. Jauregui said Moore was the assistant DA at the time, and said he never put “DA” after his name. Jauregui, seemingly alleging that Nelson or someone copied Moore’s signature from the court papers in the divorce, said Moore’s assistant, would stamp Moore’s signature on documents and then add his own initials, D.A., next to it.

“That’s exactly how the signature appears on the divorce decree that Judge Moore signed dismissing the divorce action with Ms. Nelson,” Jauregui said. “Knowing these things, I’ve got a question Gloria Allred and Ms. Nelson, do you still hold that everything written in that yearbook was written by Judge Moore or was it written by someone else? That’s not an allegation, it’s a question.”

GettyRepublican candidate for U.S. Senate Judge Roy Moore speaks during a mid-Alabama Republican Club’s Veterans Day event on November 11 in Vestavia Hills, Alabama.

Jauregui spoke Wednesday amid growing calls for Moore to drop out of the Senate race. But a source close to the campaign told CNN that Moore does not plan to step aside.

Jaurgeui’s press conference also came as the Alabama GOP held an emergency meeting, according to CNN. Details of that meeting were not made public.

Republicans have floated different options on how to replace Moore, including a right-in campaign by his primary opponent, Senator Luther Strange, or a plan to have Attorney General Jeff Sessions attempt to return to his old seat.

Jauregui is held his press conference in Birmingham outside of the Alabama republican Party headquarters. Moore has been defiant and has indicated he will fight back against the accusations through lawsuits, but none have been filed.

Jauregui did not address the accusations made last week by Leigh Corfman, who said Moore sexually assaulted her when she was 14. Moore has previously denied those accusations.

Jauregui said it takes time to work through the allegations, especially because the campaign doesn’t have a large budget, and “we want to be correct. We want to make sure that when we say something, it’s proper.”


2. He Represented Moore During the Ten Commandments & Gay Marriage Cases That Both Ended With Moore Being Removed as Chief Justice

Ten Commandments monument supporters gather in prayer around the monument in the State Judicial Building rotunda during a protest August 20, 2003 in Montgomery, Alabama.

Jauregui was the counsel of record for Roy Moore during two controversies that led to Moore being removed as chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court.

The first was in 2003, when Moore was removed from office for refusing to remove a Ten Commandments monument commissioned by him from the Alabama Judicial Building. Moore was unsuccessful in appealing his removal, but ran for office again in 2013 and was elected a second time.

Jauregui was again Moore’s attorney in May 2016, when he was removed from office a second time. In the second case, Moore was removed because he directed Alabama’s probate judges to continue to enforce the state’s ban on same-sex marriage, despite it being deemed unconstitutional. Moore’s appeal of that second dismissal was also unsuccessful.

He was also the chairman of Moore’s campaign for Alabama Supreme Court chief justice in 2000.

“I’ve known Judge Moore for 24 years,” Jauregui said at Wednesday’s press conference. “When these allegations came out within the last week it was incredibly painful for him, his wife, his mom, his daughter, grandchildren. In these types of cases there’s always someone who is alleging and the other person. And in those cases when it’s true, it’s horrible for the person making the allegations. But when the allegations are made and it’s not true, it’s also horrible for the person who the allegations are directed against.”

Jauregui told reporters, “I’ve travelled with Judge Moore all over the state, different states across the nation, I’ve been with him in probably over 100 different meetings and been around probably in excess of 10,000 different ladies in Judge Moore’s presence, and not once, not one time have I ever seen him act even remotely inappropriate against any woman, toward any woman. Not when they were walking away, not when he and I were in private afterwards. That’s the man I know and that I’ve known for the last 24 years.”


3. Jauregui Is a Partner in an Alabama Law Firm & the President of the Judicial Action Group

Jauregui is a partner in the law firm Jauregui & Lindsey.

“At Jauregui & Lindsey, Phillip manages the foreclosure and estate planning practice groups. Throughout his law practice, Phillip has worked with attorneys in over forty-five states,” the firm’s website says.

Jauregui is also the president of the Judicial Action Group, a non-profit organization, “working towards judicial renewal and an agenda to address judicial activism,” according to its website.

In 2008, he defined judicial activism in an interview with the Life Legal Defense Foundation as:

Judicial activism is when judges legislate from the bench. Judges are supposed to make decisions according to legislative guidelines put in place by the representatives of the people reflecting the will of the people. When that is not done, you get activism. Roe v. Wade is a great example. Not only is the word abortion not in the Constitution, neither is the word privacy. Even pro-abortion attorneys have agreed. For example, the dean of Stanford Law School, Larry Kramer, has written about this problem. I interviewed him a few years ago and he told me that he wanted abortion to be legal but he wanted it to be legal by the will of 300 million Americans, not by the will of five justices on the Supreme Court. What Dean Kramer was saying is what I have been saying: Let the legislative branch do its work of making laws and let the court decide disputes between people.

He has an advocacy office in Washington, D.C.

“I lobby and work against judicial activism up in Washington, D.C., because of the importance such activism has in the areas of the law concerning unborn life, marriage, decency, and our national relationship with God. For me, this work is a ministry and my passion,” he told the Life Legal Defense Foundation. “It is related to every issue that is dear to me as a Christian.”


4. He Graduated from the University of Alabama & Went to Law School at Samford University

Jauregui attended the University of Alabama, graduating in 1992 ith an English degree, according to his Linkedin profile. He then attended the Cumberland School of Law at Samford University, graduating in 1995.

He was admitted to the Alabama State Bar in 1995 and is also admitted to practice law before the U.S. Supreme Court and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

Jauregui clerked for former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Perry Hooper and was the assistant legal advisor to former Alabama Governor Fob James Jr., according to his law firm’s website.

According to the firm’s website, Jauregui has been a guest on several talk radio shows, and has also appeared on Fox News, CNN, CNBC, ABC and other TV programs.


5. He is Married & Has 2 Sons

phillip jaregui

Phillip Jauregui and his wife.

Jauregui, 47, is originally from Oceanside, California. He is married, to Jennifer Piper Jauregui, of Montgomery, according to his law firm’s website.

The couple has two sons, Phillip III and Samuel, and lives in Birmingham.

Along with his work with the Judicial Action Group, Jauregui is a former member of the Council for National Policy and a past board member for the “crisis pregnancy center” Sav-A-Life. He was also on the boards of Prison Fellowship and Wealth Counsel, “the largest national organization of estate and trust planning attorneys.”

According to the Judicial Action Group website, “In June 2005, he began serving as an organizer for a new national grassroots education and lobbying organization, Judeo-Christian Council for Constitutional Restoration, Inc. which was dedicated for the next generation to stopping judicial supremacy.”

Additionally, “He has served the national non-profit realm as Executive Director of the Judeo-Christian Council and in the coalition building venue for ValuesVoter.Org, which coordinated over fifty national ministries on a common legislative agenda: the “Values Voters Contract with Congress.”

He is a trustee for the Church of the Highlands.