Stacy George is running for Governor as an independent

Former GOP Alabama gubernatorial candidate Stacy George joined the Brandon and Christopher Show Podcast recently. George is running for Governor again.....this time he says as an independent. George previously ran in 2022 and 2014, losing to incumbent Governor Kay Ivey (R) and then incumbent Gov. Robert Bentley (R). George is a former Morgan County Commissioner and previously ran in a special election for the Alabama Legislature.

George has become a national figure after he appeared prominently in an HBO documentary, 'The Alabama Solution,' criticizing the Alabama Department of Corrections where George worked as a corrections officer.

"I'm going to tell you something. That 13 and a half years of my life was like, it was life changing," said George. "A lot of people call us prison guards because that's what you see if you watch the movie the Alabama Solution. That's what you see as prison guards, but we're highly trained correctional officers. But the reason nobody calls us correction officer after three months of training at Selma is because we act like prison guards. Most or a lot of them do."

George talked about efforts that the Department of Corrections has implemented to try to improve conditions for the 20,191 people incarcerated in the Alabama prison system (May 2025 number).

"At times when I left the prison, there was five officers. Now that's better now. They've lowered the standards. They're paying more money. They've got recruiters out. When I left that prison three years ago, there was five officers watching 2300 inmates. So who was running the prison?"

"The Lord told me to leave because I had a two dream visions and my wife confirmed it that that I was going to be killed if I didn't leave the prison. This is the first show I've talked about that on."

"A year before I quit, I got hit by an 18-wheeler bringing an inmate back (to the prison after a medical issue). Anyway, a year later, I got a settlement, which wasn't a whole lot, but we put $3,000 with it and paid off everything we had. So that allowed me to quit three weeks later. But I needed to quit anyway because I couldn't hardly walk up and down the stairs."

We asked Stacy about attacks on corrections officers.

"I would say every officer that has ever been attacked at the prison that I that I witnessed instigated the attack in some form or fashion. Now, did that make it right? No. But the biggest fear I had in the prison was who I was standing beside. I had an inmate in there that I kept closer to me than any officer because I didn't trust some of the officers."

"I had an incident when I first went to work there. Well, I'd been there a few years and I'd already run for governor once. You got to realize all the inmates in there loved me. I never had to use a stick or a spray the whole time I was in there. I had an incident where I ran by myself to the chapel. There was two inmates fighting and all of a sudden they dropped their weapons and they just stand there. And I'm like, "What happened, man?" I said, "No, they're not scared of me." And then I turned around and there was an inmate behind me that towered over me. I'll never forget it. And I said, "What happened?" And he said, "George, Governor George," that's what they called me. He said, "We can't let nothing happen to you because you're the only voice we have cause they'll put you on TV if you run for governor or something. You tell them about prison reform and ain't nobody in this prison going to kill you cause we protecting you. No officer or no inmate."

George has run for governor twice now before as a Republican, but this time is running as an independent,

"I'll tell you why I don't run as Republican. Because the party doesn't get involved anymore, but it ain't like it used to be. When I got involved in 97, we had competitive races for governor. We had competitive race for lieutenant governor, attorney general, and now there's no competition anymore." "The reason I can't do it is because special interest, you know, put $5 million. They put they all get together when they figure out who they're going to run. They put millions of dollars behind their candidate that's going to run that's going to be governor and there's not a competitive race. So why do I want to spend again my income tax money and get qualified? Then I don't have any money and I can't raise any money and I'm not rich. So I have no way to do this except for make it to November."

George was defeated by then incumbent Governor Robert Bentley in 2014, but George together with State Auditor Jim Zeigler (R) filed a complaint with the Alabama Ethics Commission that led eventually to Bentley's forced ouster. This led to Lt. Governor Kay Ivey's elevation to the Governor's mansion. She was elected again in 2018 and 2022.

"I may have made a mistake by filing the ethics complaints on Bentley to get Ivy in. I thought I was doing a service. Jim Zeigler and I testified in court in my book here. The documents is that's all in my book, you know. I mean, I tell the story how I'm going to win this time and I tell a story of Bentley and all that, but I kind of wonder and kind of just wonder if I shouldn't have done that because that put her in for a decade. And that was crazy. "

To qualify for the ballot in a statewide race George will need approximately 43,000 registered Alabama voters sign to grant him ballot access. George is confident that he will be able to accomplish that."

"I could have these signatures probably in two months, probably a week, okay, to get on the ballot. 43,000 is nothing. I haven't even started yet. I've got it already. But I'm not trying to create another pre political party. I'm just going the only avenue I can to make it to November where I have never lost a race in November. I'm two and 0 (running for county commissioner as the GOP nominee). Tuberville is one and 0 and if Doug Jones gets in there, he's one and one. I've never been in November. Black people and white people both vote for me."

George said that money has corrupted the process and made elections less competitive.

"It's not competitive. I mean, it should be where you could run, Brandon could run, and I could run and we could all raise a few hundred thousand and we could debate, but now there's no debate. I mean, the last debate we had was when Bentley was in and they had it set up so if Tuberville messes up. I mean, their plan B is Will's (Lt. Governor Ainsworth) sitting there not running for anything because he's the backup plan. I mean, Tuberville doesn't even live in the state of Alabama really. And that'll be an issue when we run."

"I'm not going to let people I'm not going to let any party, Democrat or Republican, keep me off the ballot. I'm tired of this politics. I'm tired of both parties fighting every every time."

George said that his administration will be bipartisan and include both Republicans and Democrats.

"As an independent candidate, I'm going to put somebody like (Democratic State Representative Chris) England in my cabinet. The Democrat that's got brains, okay? And somebody like I would be like somebody like Arthur Orr (Republican State Senator) or Scott Beason (former Republican State Senator). And what I would do is put each party, somebody that's not a knucklehead, and I'd say, "Come on down here and let's go to work for the people of Alabama, y'all because together, see what we agree on. Let's pass it. We'll argue about what we're not going to agree on, but we're not going to hold the people hostage." You see what I'm saying?'"

We asked George how he is going to get 43,000 ballot signatures.

"This is the plan right now. I turn my resignation in where I work at school. So my wife, we have our finances set up where I'm free. So after Thursday of this week, all I do is get in that car and go, I've got a network of people all over the state. They're ready to get signatures and I'll activate them." "I need 43 people to get a thousand votes or I need a thousand people to get 43."

"Republicans are arrogant right now because the Republican party, they they're like whatever they want. They got a super majority and they go, the reason they don't need to worry about me too much is me winning governor doesn't destroy them because they still got a super majority, right? I've got to work with the Republicans because I can't get anything passed."

George said that he told the late Governor Guy Hunt (R) that he wanted to run for Governor.

"And he said, 'Run for county commissioner first and then run for governor.' He gave me some advice. He said, ''Everywhere you work the whole time until you get to the point where you win this thing because the Lord you he could feel the Lord on me right then.' He said, 'Because everywhere you work, make sure you got people around you to put in those positions' because, you know, he believed I would win and I wasn't even a registered voter, so I took a course in political science and got political science student of the year. I never took much college at all."

The HBO documentary has resulted in renewed interest in George's book "Let George Do it!"

"And they're sold out now. So, apparently, somebody buying them. I've been giving them away for years. Now everybody buying them. Can't even buy them at Books a Million and Walmart. They're all over. But you can't even get them now."

Governor Ivey has built a new megaprison in Elmore County that opens next year and is beginning work on a second in Escambia County.

"I would stop the building of the other one (the Escambia one) immediately. And I would take the one that they built that - really I mean we need some new facilities or something - But it doesn't hold any more people and the inmates going to tear this thing apart. It's going to look like the other prisons pretty soon if you ain't got enough people to watch them. And even if you did, things just get torn up in prison. 13 and a half years I've watched it. You can have an old building. and they'll get to all pieces."

"What I would do with the new prison, I was I'd move all my men mentally challenged, the ones that are well special needs rather every overnight because they eat a candy bar on the bed that somebody give them. They're raped and ravaged."

We asked George to clarify what he was talking about with the candy bar and the special needs person being raped. He explained that they put the candy bar on the special needs inmate's bed. He makes the mistake of eating it and then they demand that he submits to rape.

"Because they'll owe them then. It might be cookies or whatever, but whenever somebody special needs comes in, they leave that on their bed most time and they're baiting them up. Five officers watch 2,300 inmates. So, how are we going to catch that? Sometimes I had to get it. If I if they did get it, I tried to buy them back. So, I'd go get some honey buns from somebody and go buy the buy their payment back and tell them not to do it anymore. But, if I don't get to them, they're done."

George said that he would ban porn on the prison TV if he was the governor.

"A female officer can't even work in the cube because there's porn. The state's paying for porn pretty much almost full-blown porn on every TV at about 8:00 till midnight. Half of them's in there. I don't know what kind of crowd we got watching this, but they're masturbating watching the TV. Then they get aroused and then they do other things after midnight when the TV goes off. That's rehabilitation for the state. Need to cut all the TVs off other than news. So they may have cut that out, but when I left that was what was on TV."

"Nobody cares. Republicans hearts aren't right. You know, they've been lock them up and throw away the key until their son gets in there or their grandson and then they're like, 'Hey, we need prison reform."

George said that being kind to prisoners is what Jesus instructed us to do.

"This is the NLT, New Living Translation. 'The spirit of the sovereign Lord is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor.' All right. It says, 'He has sent me to comfort the brokenhearted and to proclaim that captives will be released and prisoners will be freed. He has sent me to tell those who mourn that the time of the Lord's favor has come and with it the day of God's anger against their enemies.'" "I can't find anything in there where we supposed to beat them to death or treat them bad. Now, I believe they need to be in prison, but their treatment is being in prison, separated from the family, not seeing their kids. I mean, you know, that's punishment for me."

"You can't run for governor of Alabama and win in a Republican primary and tell them you want to let inmates out of prison." George said. "They look at you crazy. Probably not a winning issue, right?" "So maybe when I was running, I wasn't trying to win, right?"

"I wasn't trying to win governor then because I was just trying to tell them about prisons. I saved my income tax money up so I could go and spend it on qualifying $2,300 or whatever so I could go tell people something. I'd have a microphone. Well, now by the grace of God that I'm in that movie and all these times I've run now everybody googles my name and they go, 'My lord, where you been?' I got people investigating me, got pictures of my house and they tell me, 'We want to know who you are. Where'd you come from?' I spend nights with people and they just pull my brain and they say, 'Where'd you come from?' I said, I don't know. I guess God kept me hid till now so I could tell the story and maybe things will change."

"The Alabama fans are not going to vote for Tommy Tuberville in November if they have another option," said George. "And they're not going to vote for Doug Jones." "The thing of it is he (Tuberville) ain't never had to debate. The poor fella, I told him I want to meet him before I debate him because they'll have to debate me if I get in November. And I hate to I don't want to be bragging, okay? But listen, I will eat their lunch on every issue."

The Brandon and Christopher Show Podcast is cohosted by Alabama Gazette lead reporter and content manager Brandon Moseley and Alabama Political Contributor publisher Christopher Peeks.

To comment or to ask a question email brandonmreporter@gmail.com