DETAILS EMERGE ABOUT DRAMATIC RESIGNATION OF LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR
With the sudden and unceremonious resignation of Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott today, the woman who brought Obamacare expansion to Alaska and who has overseen the collapse of the Alaska Psychiatric Institute is now running Alaska’s elections.
She also guards the State Seal and publishes regulations.
She’s now Gov. Bill Walker’s shadow running mate, although Mallott remains on the official ballot.
Valerie Davidson was one of Gov. Bill Walker’s first hires when he became governor in 2014. She has overseen the Department of Health and Social Services, including the significant cost overruns associated with Medicaid expansion in Alaska.
While Mallott is technically the running mate, he is no longer lieutenant governor. Mallott cannot remove his name from the ballot. Ballots have been printed and votes have been cast already.
This will cause some confusion among voters, and has certainly caused confusion in the Walker-Mallott campaign and the Unite Alaska for Walker-Mallott super PAC, run by Vince Beltrami and the AFL-CIO.
The AFN fundraiser scheduled for later this week for Walker-Mallott has been cancelled. Meanwhile, Davidson had already been named the keynote speaker for the Alaska Federation of Natives convention on Thursday.
While we don’t know exactly what actions occurred, the Walker Administration acknowledged there is a victim.
Sources say the victim is under the age of 18, and it’s known that Mallott was at the Elders and Youth Conference on Monday night until late last night.
The governor said he didn’t find out about the problem until later in the evening, Must Read Alaska has been told.
The Walker campaign has cancelled all campaign volunteer activities for the remainder of the week.
Walker had spent his lunch hour angrily attacking his opponent Mike Dunleavy in a Downtown Anchorage Rotary Forum. He criticized him for not attending debates and lashed out at him repeatedly.
But at the same time, Walker was sitting on a big secret that he was keeping from all Alaskans, while in a room filled with Alaska’s business community and media. Shortly after the forum, Walker returned to the Atwood Building, where he secretly swore in Davidson as lieutenant governor while accepting the resignation of Mallott.
Then he provided a minimally informational press release and then refused to answer questions from the press. This prompted KTUU reporter Rich Mauer to tell Walker’s Press Secretary Austin Baird, “This is what the gov accuses Dunleavy of, not answering questions.”
The Democrats’ nominee Mark Begich has said nothing, but Dunleavy issued a statement:
“As we, like all Alaskans, await details surrounding the resignation of the lieutenant governor, our campaign remains focused on restoring trust in state government.
“We need safe neighborhoods, a health economy and full Permanent Fund dividends. This campaign has always been about the people of Alaska, not politicians.”
The Division of Elections posted the explanation of why Mallott’s name will remain on the ballot and how it is legally possible to vote for Walker-Mallott but not end up with Walker-Mallott in office:
Lieutenant Gov. Byron Mallott resigned today and Commissioner of Health and Social Services Valerie Davidson was sworn in as lieutenant governor. The events took place quickly in mid-day.
The announcement of Byron Mallott’s resignation was leaked before noon, but came after a secret swearing in of Davidson.
Davidson has helped lead Gov. Bill Walker’s charge in abdicating the State’s authority in favor of tribal sovereignty. And she led the charge for Obamacare Medicaid expansion in Alaska. She will now be in charge of the Division of Elections.
One decision the Walker campaign will have to make is who will be on the ticket with Walker. Mallott’s name is on the ballot now and some ballots have already been voted via absentee. Some 21,000 ballots were sent out absentee and 1,000 or more have been returned.
Intelligence that Must Read Alaska has indicates that this relates to Mallott’s behavior.
Update: Mallott is said to have made inappropriate comments to a woman.
Governor Walker and Lieutenant Governor Davidson released the following statements:
“It is with profound disappointment and sadness that I accepted the resignation of Lieutenant Governor Byron Mallott.
“Byron recently made inappropriate comments that do not reflect the sterling level of behavior required in his role as Lieutenant Governor. I learned of the incident last night. Byron has taken full responsibility for his actions and has resigned.
“As leaders, we must hold ourselves to the highest standards of conduct.
“Valerie Davidson was confirmed as Lieutenant Governor-designee earlier this April. She was sworn in today as Lieutenant Governor. Doctor Jay Butler has been appointed Commissioner of the Department of Health and Social Services. Alaskans can be confident that Valerie Davidson will assume the duties of Lieutenant Governor with grace and dignity.”
“Alaskans deserve the highest standards of conduct by their elected officials. While I am deeply saddened by the resignation of Lt. Governor Byron Mallott, I am profoundly disappointed by his conduct,” said Davidson.
“Respect for women, and the dignity of all Alaskans, is our responsibility. I stand ready to serve as your Lieutenant Governor,” Davidson said.
Mallott became lieutenant governor after he first was the Democrat nominee for governor in 2014. He stepped aside to allow Bill Walker to run in his slot, and he filled the lieutenant governor slot on the “unity ticket”. The two of them beat Sean Parnell in the General Election.
What did Lt. Gov. Mallott say and to whom? Some say it was this story:
This is the fourth Democratic forced resignation in 18 months due to misconduct involving treatment of women. The others include Representatives Dean Westlake, Zach Fansler, Justin Parish, and now Byron Mallott.
The Fairbanks North Star Borough School Board will consider a resolution Tuesday evening (Oct. 16) that adopts November as LGBTQ month, and promotes the teaching of LGBTQ culture and history in classrooms from kindergarten through 12th grade.
Resolution 2019-08 recognizes that discrimination is bad and inclusion is good. It is being brought to the board by the district’s diversity committee.
Most of the resolution could be applied to people as a whole — all members of the education community should be valued and supported, regardless of their race, gender, or ability. In other words, be nice and don’t discriminate.
But the resolution goes a step further, to encourage the teaching of a specific kind of history — LGBTQ history and culture — throughout the month, and throughout the grades.
“WHEREAS, all students and staff members will benefit from inclusion of LGBTQ history and culture,” the resolution reads.
That “will benefit from” clause prompts teachers to include Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered, Queer history and culture in their classrooms.
Not all parents think that’s a benefit. Some think it’s an agenda.
The resolution promotes the contributions and accomplishments of people who have an ever-elastic gender and sexual attraction identity, and recognizes the LGBTQ community as a “growing asset.”
Some parents wonder if public schools are taking it too far. The resolution, after all, involves the teaching of human sexuality, always a controversial subject. It takes sex ed and makes it into a month-long event to normalize what some parents think is not the schools’ role, but the parents’ role.
Teachers are not forced to include these topics in their coursework, but some of them are likely to do so, bringing in drag queen story times, and special visits from LGBTQ advocates. Teachers who identify strongly with the LGBTQ movement will tend to push the boundaries from teaching respect to teaching make-up tricks.
The United Nations and Planned Parenthood have promoted curricula that reaches down as far as kindergarten to ensure that five-year-olds learn about gender fluidity. That puts schools on a collision course with parents who are teaching traditional values at home.
Elizabeth Holm, a parent from North Pole, noted that the schools are teaching that gender has nothing to do with actual biology. She encourages parents to consider opting out of school in November.
“If this is something your family is not comfortable with, Alaska Law permits parents to keep their students home the duration of the resolution but the students are still responsible for completing their homework and this does not count toward missed days, but you do need to communicate about your intentions with administration,” she wrote.
In other words this could be a perfect time to try out homeschooling, she said.
At the risk of being accused of beating a dead voter, er, horse, we still wonder what happened in the District 15 GOP primary election, where seven deceased applied for absentee ballots and 26 ballots were nullified because of irregularities.
That particular race pitted Rep. Gabrielle LeDoux – who got all the votes on the 26 pulled ballots, by the way – against challenger Aaron Weaver. LeDoux was losing in the initial count, but won when all the absentee and other ballots were counted.
Clearly, whatever happened, somebody broke the law, but state officials, particularly in the Department of Law, are remarkably tight-lipped about whether they are investigating despite the looming Nov. 6 general election.
Most of the primary ballot problems sprang from only a few trailers in a single Muldoon trailer park where some of Anchorage’s 6,000-strong Hmong community live. It appears a lot of people were registered to vote from those trailers. When reporters asked people there why so many were voting from just a few trailers, they replied, “Ask Gabrielle.”
Anchorage Assemblyman Chris Constant last month proposed that all bikes in Anchorage be registered, pay a fee, or be fined for not doing so.
There was hell to pay.
This week, in the face of mounting criticism and ridicule, Constant backed off from his proposal.
Constant is concerned that bikes are being stolen, taken apart and sold for parts. His idea was to register bicycles, provide stickers for them, so they could be more easily traced once stolen. Critics said it was blaming the bike owners for the problem of increasing crime in the city.
The Anchorage Assembly was set to take up the question on the Oct. 23 agenda, but once the idea hit Facebook, there was a firestorm of opposition.
In other communities that have tried registering bikes, the cost of registration and management of the fees and fines far outweighed the benefits.
Honolulu, however, does require bikes to sport a current registration sticker. But a similar measure in Seattle failed in the 1970s.
Seattle Department of Transportation said that the cost of mandatory bicycle license programs have not worked out in Los Angeles or Detroit, where they’ve been tried.
One thing Assemblyman Constant is correct about: The city’s greenbelts are littered with bikes that have been taken apart, with non valuable parts left abandoned.
Every year a thousand or more bikes are stolen in Anchorage. But there is a voluntary registration system that is posted at the municipality’s web site. You can access it here.
The Native village with the highest increase in voter turnout will receive a prize of $10,000 for its school from the First Alaskans Institute. European-heritage settlements need not apply.
That is according to an Alaska Native who works at the Alaska Gasline Development Corporation, although no announcement has been made by the First Alaskans Institute on the organization’s website.
Three members of the Walker Administration sit on the 10-member board of the Institute: Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott, Al Kookesh, a special assistant to the governor, and Valerie Davison, commissioner of Health and Social Services. Elizabeth Medicine Crow is the CEO and president.
The second highest turnout will receive $5,000. Both checks would go to the local school.
“Youth in villages- tell your parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles to go vote on November 6!! Parents, get out and vote so your school kids may benefit from this money!! Even if you don’t have school kids, get out and vote for the sake of the school! Get the money!!” Donna Bach wrote on Facebook.
While paying for votes is illegal, there appears to be no law against incentivizing an entire community to vote, although paying a village, or funneling money to the village school is a new concept in “get out the vote” tactics.
If Mark Begich, who is running for governor, ran a raffle for a million dollars for registered Democrats, would the State allow it? Unlikely.
But where it gets into the stickiest territory is that Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott is on the board of trustees for First Alaskans Institute, while at the same time is in charge of the Division of Elections.
Mallott, a Democrat, has an obvious stake in his own re-election. He cannot assert with a straight face that higher turnout in villages won’t benefit him.
Rural areas are least likely to vote Republican and have the least familiarity with Republican Mike Dunleavy, who will be on the ballot as well.
The Institute is the prime sponsor of this week’s AFN Conferences’ Elders and Youth Conference at the Dena’ina Center, which is underway through Wednesday.
Donna Bach, who broadcast the news of the village voting incentive on Facebook, is the director of Alaska Native Affairs at Alaska Gasline Development Corporation, which is also under the direction of the Governor’s Office. The news has since been shared by more than 100 Facebook users.
The Dunleavy for Alaska campaign has set a new bar for graphic design excellence, and Alaskans have collected the whole set of campaign signs just because they are so attractive.
But the campaign just took a graphical turn: The new sign is short on looks and tall on message: “Save the PFD,” it reads. The sign encourages people to text PFD to the number 55022. By doing so, you’ll get updates from the campaign between now and Nov. 6.
“Save the PFD” is one of those unique phrases that only Alaskans understand. PFD stands for Permanent Fund Dividend, and the fact that Bill Walker, the sitting governor, cut Alaskans’ dividend in half is one of the big campaign themes of the year.
So Walker is trying to explain himself — his sign. with his own “Saved the PFD” message, is seen on buses around Anchorage:
In the meantime, The Dunleavy for Alaska legacy signs already on roadsides and yards come in a wide range of colors and graphic representations that look like coveted Patagonia apparel decals:
All year, Gov. Bill Walker has been the least popular governor in America who is facing reelection, according to Morning Consult, which has been tracking governors’ popularity since 2016. But it’s gotten worse.
54 percent of Alaskans polled said they disapprove of the job Walker has done. During the first quarter poll, 52 percent disapproved of him. This is not the direction an incumbent likes to crow about, and you’re not likely to read a press release from the Walker-Mallott campaign about this abysmal result.
What has to concern Walker even more is that his approval rating slid from 29 percent in the first quarter to 25 percent in the third quarter.
That matches up where he has been in other polls, too — even the Ivan Moore poll, which leans left.
WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOU’RE THAT FAR DOWN? A NUCLEAR ATTACK
The “October Surprise” is almost an article of faith in political gossip circles.
KTVA reporter Rhonda McBride warns one is coming in the governor’s race. The target: Mike Dunleavy.
Art Hackney, political consultant to the stars, told McBride it’s coming. He’s heard it, she reported.
Progressive pollster Ivan Moore told McBride that an October Surprise is all but a certainty.
But what is it really? It’s likely an October Smear. With just 21 days left, there’s not much else for a low-performing candidate with a lot of cash to do.
Rhonda could not get them to say what the Walker camp has in mind, or if she did she is not telling the public. She’s laying the groundwork for what is likely to be rolled out next week, on Oct. 22 — something so vicious that the media will HAVE to pick up on the story. Reporters will not be able to ignore it.
According to Alaska Republican Party Chairman Tuckerman Babcock, this is a case of reporter’s itch, a condition known to make a journalist’s face blush.
“Rhonda couldn’t land an exclusive interview with Dunleavy so she’s taking her revenge by reporting that there’s an October surprise,” said Babcock. “She’s tossing her journalistic integrity out the window, reporting on gossipers gossiping about gossip, with no substantiation.”
Dunleavy has given interviews to some journalists, but not all of them — at least not to date. McBride may have a tough time landing an interview with him now.
Vince Beltrami and Gov. Bill Walker, signing a labor agreement this weekend.
“[Ivan] Moore says, based on what he’s heard in various political circles, an October surprise of some kind has been in the works for some time – one that could possibly cut into Dunleavy’s comfortable lead,” according to McBride.
“Based on what he’s heard in various political circles?” This is the Ivan Moore who does polling for Democrats. The political circles he runs in have just one mission — search and destroy rising Republicans.
That Dunleavy lead Moore referred to is comfortably in the high 40s, which is good for a three-way race.
Meanwhile, Walker’s disapproval rating is now the highest that it has been since he was elected governor: Just one in four Alaskan approve of his performance.
10 INTERVIEWED FOR THE KTVA POLL, BUT JUST ONE IS A REPUBLICAN?
In McBride’s story, she interviewed random people in Anchorage and it appeared to her that most of them like Bill Walker or Mark Begich for governor. She asked them who they favor for governor.
But Must Read Alaska ran the voter registrations on the 10 random people she interviewed to see what party they most likely identify with:
Four were Democrats
One was Libertarian
One was Republican
Two two were undeclared
Two didn’t show up in the voter registration lists at all
POLITICAL HARASSMENT TRAINER COMING BACK TO ANCHORAGE THIS MONTH
ACORN, an organization that fell into disrepute and collapsed in disgrace, still has a walk-on role in radical left-wing politics, and that role now extends north to Alaska.
Recently, an organizational remnant of ACORN was active in training Alaskans go to Washington, D.C. to protest the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh — and intentionally get arrested in the process.
One of those protest organizer-trainers, Darius Gordon, will be back in Anchorage this month to meet with the Alaska Grassroots Alliance and debrief on their civil disobedience activities that were unsuccessful in blocking Kavanaugh.
Perhaps there will be more training ahead on ways to harass Alaska’s Republican politicians and how to proceed when arrested.
Gordon trained the Alliance in preparation for their D.C. arrest event, and several Alaskans were indeed taken away in handcuffs from in front of Sen. Dan Sullivan’s office. Gordon videotaped and posted it all on Twitter in September:
Gordon is also trainer in a specific technique known as birddogging, where protesters work in pairs to crowd a lawmaker, getting in his or her physical space.
These birddoggers practice tracking lawmakers, shouting at them in their face, as well as menacing them with their bodies by remaining close to impede their progress, while not touching them. They do it all without actually appearing to make an actual threat.
They are trying to provoke Republican lawmakers into a physical or verbal reaction that can be videotaped and shared on the internet. Much of CPD’s activity has the stated intent of turning voters against these conservative elected officials during the 2018 election.
Video footage of the Kavanaugh protests in September and October reveal numerous cases of birddogging, as trained by Gordon and the Center for Popular Democracy this summer.
Sen. Rick Santorum is verbally harassed by CPD bird-doggers as he tries to get into an elevator.Sen. Bob Corker is followed closely by a CPD bird-dogger, while on the other side of him, out of camera range, another birddogger blocks him from moving away.
“Birddogging” is a relatively new tactic that involves a video camera operator and persistent questioning of the tracked lawmaker in public.
As described by one left-wing site, “This form of simple, direct advocacy, when applied consistently, is amazingly effective –and yet, astonishingly rare. In 2018’s election year, birddogging is how we will win the policies we need. Together we can get trained up and plugged in to a national activist network that is going to play a huge role in 2018 and 2020, making sure than *everyone* running for office agrees to a bold progressive vision–that makes America sane again. Let’s get off the internet, and focus our energy on people who actually have the power to give us what we want, in person and in-public, especially when candidates are most accessible and amendable, during election season!”
CPD trains people to birddog lawmakers not only at the U.S. Capitol, but in public places, including restaurants and airports, and to scream at them when they go into a restroom, as this woman birddogger did:
Republican lawmakers such as Sen. Ted Cruz and members of the Trump Administration have experienced increased harassment from the group and its copy-cats.
Darius Gordon’s second visit to Alaska indicates that harassment will be the new norm from the Alaska Grassroots Alliance, which started training earlier this year for civil disobedience.
During one of their trainings in a church in Spenard, a heavy metal musician sprayed the group of pacifists with a can of pepper spray. He is currently in jail.
BUT HOW IS CENTER FOR POPULAR DEMOCRACY RELATED TO ACORN?
ACORN, the international network of community organizations known as Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, became embroiled in a series of scandals that ended its its financial demise in 2010, after video footage became public showing ACORN organizers actively involved in promulgating voter fraud and other frauds in key states.
President Obama had several ties to the group, including using it for a get-out-the-vote effort on his campaign.
But at its height, ACORN was powerful, with chapters in over 100 cities in the U.S., and more internationally.
Its founder, Wade Rathke, eventually ended up in Juneaurunning the Mental Health Consumer Action Network, a fledgling advocacy group. He has since apparently returned to community organizing with ACORN International, which still exists, and he appears to live in Louisiana.
Although ACORN in the U.S. died an ignominious death, one of its key players, Brian Kettering, is now the head of the Center for Popular Democracy, founded in 2012. That’s the group that has become involved in radicalizing Anchorage Democrats and helping them get arrested in DC during recent weeks.
HOW ANCHORAGE ACTIVISTS KNEW WHAT TO DO
Darius Gordon arrives at the Anchorage Airport in August.
In August of 2018, Darius Gordon of CPD came to Anchorage to help the Alaska Grassroots Alliance organize a trip to Washington, D.C. where protesters planned to be arrested to try to prevent Sen. Lisa Murkowski from voting in favor of Kavanaugh’s confirmation. He had funds to assist.
The strategy worked — at least in part. Murkowski voted against Kavanaugh’s confirmation, although he was ultimately confirmed.
Several of the Alaska protesters were arrested and had their bail posted by the Center for Popular Democracy. In fact, an unknown number of protesters from the Alaska Grassroots Alliance had their entire round trip to DC funded by CPD, and had their bail reimbursed as well.
The Center for Popular Democracy received money last year from the Open Society Foundation, one of the primary funding funnels of George Soros. About half of CPD’s funding comes from the Ford, Open Society, and Wyss Foundations. Reports for this year’s funding sources are not yet available.
