In short tweet, Trump congratulates Moore on runoff win, gets general election date wrong

Donald Trump.
(Image credit: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

President Trump didn't back Roy Moore in the Alabama Republican Senate primary, but he was quick to congratulate him on Tuesday night after he defeated Trump's pick, incumbent Sen. Luther Strange.

"Congratulations to Roy Moore on his Republican Primary win in Alabama," Trump tweeted. "Luther Strange started way back & ran a good race. Roy, WIN in Nov.!" That will be impossible for Moore to do, seeing as how the general election is set for Dec. 12.

UPDATE 10:23 p.m. ET: Trump has tweeted the same congratulatory message for a second time, now urging Moore to "WIN in Dec!" He did not delete the message wishing him luck in November.

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UPDATE 10:27 p.m. ET: The original tweet has been deleted.

UPDATE 11:10 p.m. ET: Trump appears to be on a deleting spree, also scrubbing his account of messages supporting Strange, according to ProPublica's erased-tweet tool, including one he sent out Tuesday morning that read: "Luther Strange has been shooting up in the Alabama polls since my endorsement. Finish the job — vote today for 'Big Luther.'"

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.