Good riddance

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By ANCHORAGE DAILY PLANET

The moribund Recall Dunleavy effort is closing up shop as of today. Or so says the campaign’s chairwoman, Meda DeWitt, in op-ed pieces in the Anchorage Daily News and Cordova Times.

While there was a media frenzy when the effort to unseat Gov. Mike Dunleavy got off the ground on Aug. 1, 2019, there has been little media mention of the fizzling campaign’s long-overdue demise, other than DeWitt’s pieces.

The campaign to get Dunleavy – and that is exactly what it was – got underway within weeks of his being elected. Dunleavy was sworn into office Dec. 3, 2018. The Recall Dunleavy domain was registered Feb. 2, 2019, only 62 days into Dunleavy’s term. The ink on his oath of office barely was dry.

Dunleavy did not release his “austerity budget” until Feb. 13, 2019, and his veto of $444 million from the already-trimmed operating budget approved by the Legislature, which caused big-government advocates to melt down, did not occur until months later, at the end of June.

It appears somebody was engineering the recall effort even before Dunleavy’s budget cut and vetoes — planning it before he had done much of anything.

What never has been revealed to Alaskans is who paid for the two-year effort to recall Dunleavy for offenses mostly imagined. As of this past weekend, a little more than two years after it got underway, the effort had gathered 62,373 of the 71,252 signatures needed to force a special recall election. Who picked up the tab? Unions? Outside billionaires? Other usual leftist suspects? Who knows?

State law inexplicably shielded donors to the Recall Dunleavy, which could collect and spend money from anybody, except foreign interests, and – unlike political campaigns – not reveal where it came from or went, at least until the effort gathered enough signatures to win a spot on the ballot.

Only if any signature-gathering money eventually were plowed into a recall election campaign would backers be forced to report every penny collected and spent since the effort’s start. If none of the signature-gathering money ever ended up in the election campaign, its source would remain secret.

Then, the money gathered from who-knows-where to Recall Dunleavy can go just about anyplace without Alaskans or the Alaska Public Offices Commission having any idea where it went.

There are those who believe that was the real intent of the recall campaign, to gather a treasure trove of information about those who signed petitions and, along the way, gather money from secret sources that can be used later for other leftist causes. If it could destroy Dunleavy along the way, so much the better.

Alaskans likely never will know who paid the bill for this political hit job. The good news is that the campaign is closing up shop – and good riddance.

Read more at the Anchorage Daily Planet.

11 COMMENTS

  1. We must have a full forensic audit of the Nov 2020 election. Let’s prove there was no election fraud. Let’s prove dark money isn’t running our elections. Let’s clean up the voter registration database as required by law!

    • Sunlight sanitizes all and exposes the machinations for all to see. Of course, those egotistical narcissistic megalomania seeking unlimited power will fight for darkness eternal. Gabby LeDoux?

  2. This is a travesty that cries out for a remedy – recall effort is not subject to APOC rules until it gets enough signatures to get on a ballot. Walker & Kendall will just roll the leftovers (most of what they raised) into their personal accounts as pay and then proceed to use their “own” funds to start a campaign war chest. Someone needs to go to jail for this – seriously “dark” money.

  3. Support organizations for Governor Newsome needed the money prioritized for a bigger cause in California. They are very concerned that he is about to loose his recall, and rightly so. The dark money laundry mat is in full swing. California would be a big loss for the Marxists.

  4. This recall should never have happened. And with the people involved being so close to Walker, we know what the real purpose was. Alaskans should think about this: who would start a campaign like this but someone who thinks more of himself than the state of Alaska. And those who ally with him have no excuse to continue their hit pieces. Big Mike is still fighting for Alaska and took a big chance today in going ahead to spend the money. If people want things to get done, get behind your governor and let the real bullies in the legislature know they will not rule the roost.

  5. If the left learned one thing during Trump’s term, it was how to keep a shit storm aloft for 4 years to limit the effectiveness of any office holder. Look only as far as to our current assembly and the obstruction campaign already launched against the new mayor and his administration. It is time the gloves came off and these idiots were exposed for the graft and money shoveling they are commiting, while they are economically crippling Anchorage and the property owners.

  6. Even when legally required to report, the true political revolutionaries simply hide behind a crowd of front organizations and straw men like the CIA does. A pea under a table full of shells. Knowing precisely who is funding this would be nice, but there us little you can do to them directly. This type of political warfare is essentially what Demonrat leadership did to Palin and Trump, but were mostly successful with their media propaganda machine. I’m leaning toward the theory that the electorate has been educated in these tactics, and the success rate will be reversing on them, as the Newsom recall might demonstrate. Nuclear war only works well until your enemy gets nukes.
    Thus, turn it on them, and do it better. There is nothing they can do better than their enemies. Yes, it’s sad, and yes, it’s destructive, but if they insist on setting fires, throw gas in the fan, and ignite more. Burn the whole damned place down, and let’s start over. That’s their goal. Give it to them, and make it so dreadful that they regret ever being born.

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