I’ve never had a problem with a sheriff wanting deputies he can trust. I’ve felt the same way throughout my career in both the public and private sectors. When you’re responsible for an organization, you need people who will carry out your decisions, follow your direction, and represent it professionally.

That expectation doesn’t change with the size of the organization or the number of people working under you. But there’s a difference between expecting loyalty to the office and expecting personal political loyalty to whoever happens to occupy it.

Alabama law gives sheriffs considerable authority over their deputies. Deputies generally serve at the pleasure of the sheriff, and the Handbook for Alabama Sheriffs describes them as the sheriff’s alter ego. There’s a reason for that relationship. A sheriff is elected to run the department and is accountable for its direction. It would be difficult to hold him responsible for the agency while denying him authority over the deputies carrying out his decisions.

That relationship becomes more complicated when politics enters the picture. A deputy who decides to run against the sheriff is challenging the person responsible for directing his work. I understand why that creates concerns about trust, loyalty, and the ability to run the department. Depending on how the campaign is conducted, continuing to work together could become difficult.

Alabama has long given sheriffs considerable authority over their deputies, including the ability to terminate deputies who challenge them politically. But just because a sheriff has the authority to make that decision doesn’t mean it’s necessarily the right decision, especially in 2026.

Consider a deputy who actively works to undermine the department, holding meetings with other deputies to create internal conflict, deliberately interfering with operations, or leaking confidential internal affairs information to the public in an attempt to damage the sheriff’s reputation during an election. That’s no longer simply a deputy exercising his political rights. That’s an employee using his position to undermine the organization he’s supposed to serve.

That’s a very different situation from a deputy who announces his candidacy, supports another candidate, or openly disagrees with the sheriff’s policies while continuing to do his job. The sheriff may have the authority to terminate either deputy, but the reasons for exercising that authority matter.

Even when a sheriff has legitimate reasons for terminating a deputy, those reasons can get lost in the controversy surrounding the termination itself. The public may see a sheriff firing his political opponent and assume retaliation, without knowing what led to the decision. That doesn’t mean the sheriff was wrong to act, but it does mean he needs to understand how that decision will be perceived.

Twenty or thirty years ago, a personnel decision like that might not have attracted much attention outside the department or the courthouse. Today, a termination letter can be posted on social media and shared thousands of times before the sheriff has even had an opportunity to explain what happened. People who know nothing about the circumstances can form opinions based on a headline or a single Facebook post. And because sheriffs are elected officials, those opinions can have consequences well beyond the department.

There’s another side to that authority, though. Even when a sheriff never threatens or terminates anybody, deputies may understand that their political choices could affect their careers.

Consider a deputy who knows that putting the wrong campaign sign in his yard could cost him his job. Even if nobody has explicitly threatened him, he understands the potential consequences. He has the right to participate in the political process, but exercising that right can come with a price.

That kind of authority can influence an entire department without the sheriff ever having to say a word. Deputies learn which opinions to keep to themselves, which conversations to avoid, and how much disagreement the sheriff is willing to tolerate. Eventually, the sheriff may find himself surrounded by people who agree with him, or at least people who have learned that agreeing is the safest option.

And that’s where the arrangement can begin working against the sheriff himself. A deputy who won’t openly disagree about politics may also hesitate to challenge a questionable operational decision. The sheriff loses the benefit of hearing from people who might recognize a problem before he does. By the time he discovers something is wrong, the opportunity to address it quietly may already be gone.

The law gives Alabama sheriffs broad discretion in that relationship. It also places considerable responsibility on their judgment. When the same person controls a deputy’s assignments, career opportunities, and continued employment, it’s easy for personal loyalty to become confused with professional loyalty. A sheriff needs deputies he can trust. He also needs to be able to trust deputies who don’t always agree with him.