A group of Anchorage residents has organized a defense fund fundraiser to protect Anchorage Assembly Chair Felix Rivera from the recall effort that is currently being waged against him.
Led by fellow Assembly member Meg Zaletel, State Sen. Elvi Gray-Jackson, and Anchorage attorney Jim Wright, their ambitions are not huge: At this point they just want to raise $1,000 to defend Rivera.
Rivera is not the only Assembly member being targeted for recall. Zaletel and Acting Mayor Austin Quinn-Davidson are both fending off attempts at recall as well.
“Our neighbor and Assembly Member, Felix Rivera, has been unfairly targeted by a recall effort. We know Felix and we know the great work he has done for Midtown and for all of Anchorage. He’s worked hard for us and now he needs our help. Join this virtual fundraiser via Zoom to help raise funds for a Legal Defense Fund so a group of Midtown neighbors who have stood up to defend Felix can win in court,” the Zaletel group wrote on Facebook.
That was the first indication that they plan to litigate in order to prevent the recall from ever reaching the ballot.
The first to volunteer to attend the fundraiser was Russell Biggs, who actually heads up the recall effort. There’s a group organized called Reclaim Midtown that is front and center in attempting to rid the Assembly of Rivera.
“Great I’ll be there!” Biggs cheerfully wrote in the comment section, apparently with tongue in cheek.
Many of the comments underneath the event posting were not favorable toward Rivera, who was just reelected to his second term on the Assembly in April.
Soon, the comment section on the event posting became a troll-fest with one “Erica Ehm” asking each critic to confess whether he or she actually live in Rivera’s district, and then defending Rivera in his efforts to exclude people from plum jobs the city was offering by calling his critics mentally ill:
“The city’s public ethics officer said Rivera’s actions did not violate the city’s charter or ethics code, but did say would hurt public perception. No harm no foul. Jamie Allard(Republican)would have easily recruited from her own. Majority of anchorage support the actions of assembly. Loud minority feed from the same trough and just regurgitate the same stuff with blood shot eyes and their self inflicted mental illness,” Ehm wrote.
Of course, Erica Ehm doesn’t exist in real life in Alaska. Assembly member Rivera’s biggest defender is actually a troll on a roll who is neither a registered voter or a Permanent Fund applicant in the state.
Rivera came to Alaska from Texas and began working for now-disgraced former mayor Ethan Berkowitz in 2015-2016, running for office for District 4 in 2017 to become a Berkowitz ally. Berkowitz quit office in October after naked pictures of him surfaced on a reporter’s cell phone.
When he ran for reelection in 2020, Rivera said, “This Assembly is the most transparent, forward-thinking and solutions-focused body I’ve ever seen.”
That was before the photos of Berkowitz surfaced.
Learn more about the Felix Rivera Defense Fund fundraiser at this link.
Learn about how to get involved and get paid to collect recall signatures at this link.
The exodus will be significant if this current Assembly of activists retains power.
For the first time since I moved to Anchorage and to Alaska a quarter century ago, I am seriously considering getting out of and moving away from Los Anchorage/SanFranciscoNorth. I cannot stand what the politics of this municipality have sunk to. But to be honest, move to where? The cancer of cultural Marxist and nanny-statism have spread nationwide, largely I think through our (so-called) educational system.
The City Charter needs to be spruced up a little. Add that unless one has resided within the Municipality of Anchorage, let alone the state of Alaska for 10 years, shall not be allowed to run and or hold Publicly Elected Office.
Um, where were you earlier this year when the charter was “spruced up” to add a twelfth member to the Assembly? It passed by about 60-40 percent. The proponents claimed there was no reason to oppose it, which doesn’t explain their efforts behind the scenes to suppress any and all opposing arguments. The margin also doesn’t validate that claim. At least that was deliberated somewhat out in the open. You probably weren’t aware that it went hand-in-hand with the Assembly increasing its staff. Ever hear of the “engagement officer” position? See the Anchorage Daily Planet column posted to this site on January 7 for more information. If you’ve attended any Assembly meetings this year, you will know that telephonic testimony has been fraught with problems which drag the meetings out unnecessarily. This is directly the fault of Assembly staff and quite possibly this “engagement officer” specifically.
Majority of Anchorage support the Assembly? That’s an outright lie. The majority of Assembly members better head south by about 4,000 miles.
It’s perfectly OK to attempt recalling Rivera, Zaletel, and Quinn-Davidson, After all, their supporters tried their best putting recalling Dunleavy on this years ballot. It’s perfectly OK the three are actually recalled, the Alaska Democrats would hoot, holler, and cheer if Dunleavy was recalled. Remember Democrats? But, I think most Alaskans will admit when backed in a corner the government is bloated and needing a budget cut, whether government employees and its agencies like it or not.
Hey Felix, San Francisco called, and they want their insane, up-is-down, Marxist, anti-freedom, socially nihilistic agenda back.
The Emperor had no clothes.
But he does have a face mask.
I have concluded that events discovered and described by MustReadAK, and in many cases still avoided by the left and lazy tranche of the Alaska media, have convinced me that for the sake of Alaska the state capital should not be in Juneau or Anchorage. The misspending of federal money in Juneau, by the Juneau city government, and this ongoing Anchorage Assembly drama are only part of the case made by Suzanne Downing and by writers she has recruited.
So the online rally to save Felix became a Troll fest you say?
Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch..
Felix would have a sense of importance, a needed audience, somewhere in California.
This will never get better as long as the self servers had their way with us through mail-in voting.
Why does anyone cite the City atty or the City’s public ethics officer’s perspective? I’ve hired several attorneys over the years and the instant any of them tell me that what I’ve done is wrong is the instant they’re fired. If you want to find out the truth, put one up against the City and you may have something.
Until that point the important thing to remember is that every City, every corporation, every large group has an ethical guideline that they proudly post in their halls and point at every chance they get… and it doesn’t influence their behavior at all.
Is Rivera voicing the fair voice? If he really is calling people mentally ill? Did a popular assembly member refuse to speak to you because you were not cool or it would tarnish their image for election?
Elected officials that were from here used to understand and care. Now, they bring in their dirty politics to hurt locals, and their dirty behavior. Is he going to insult another Alaskan because their voices and beliefs aren’t on his agenda? If he has made a difference for his district then keep him. But, it he is being mocking, hurtful and critical of something he does not understand, then he should be held accountable. Like Gross, people are sick of contempt. A lot of people move here from Texas and California because they could not make it in their home towns. Maybe he is dishing out what happened to him in Texas?
Everyone, men and women included, want to champion the underdog, until the sexting, and the family values come into question. Now that everyone is out of the closet, hurray! Let’s practice some tolerance and conform!
The real issue is The Federal Government has expressed it’s discontent over financing anymore state government subsidies because of the lack of accountability of covid-money. No one seems to respect the people without jobs, those of us who are waiting for our normal lives to resume. We
are being ushered by unemployment to get jobs where we are yanked away from our children. The poor local restaurants that fail will be replaced by a food chain. Mocking the system is not the answer, but exploiting the system and pointing your finger at those who don’t have a plum job seem to be the issue. Mocking the labor working folk and mothers should not happen!
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