Rep. Mary Peltola attempted to walk back statements she made this week when she said the reason why she voted against an energy appropriation important to Alaska is that it didn’t have enough funding for the Denali Commission, a federal agency important to rural Alaska.
That reason turned out to be false, as the amendments that contained that Denali Commission provision failed by a wide margin, due to the votes of Republicans.
Peltola voted against the amendments, but apparently she didn’t know they failed, or perhaps she forgot when on Friday, she typed, “Thanks to hard work from the Alaska delegation, the amendment to defund the Denali Commission was voted down! I’ll continue to work with our Senators to protect Don and Ted’s legacy and make sure that this year’s budget bills work for Alaska instead of taking us backwards.”
Peltola on Friday was crediting herself for the hard work that she did, although she apparently didn’t know that the amendments failed when she had earlier told Alaskans that she voted against the bill because of the amendments because it “targets rural Alaska by eliminating the Denali Commission.”
There were numerous projects for Alaska ports that Peltola voted against, when she followed Democrat marching orders to vote against the appropriations bill:
The final version of the bill did not eliminate or reduce funding to the commission, as she claimed was her reason for opposing it.
Peltola has the worst voting record in Congress, due to the number of times she has been a no-show this year. She may still be learning the ropes, since she’s missed over one-third of all votes.
“Rep. Peltola has missed 33.6% of votes in the 118th Congress (2023-24). This makes her the 1st most absent member of the House,” according to ProPublica.
