The school year has begun in Fairbanks and the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Committee is in full swing. A standing committee of the Fairbanks North Star Borough School Board, it advises on matters relating to race, sexual orientation, and other social issues as part of the liberal agenda.
DEI is a form of reinforcing various self-selected identities, and critics say it breeds hatred and racial division.
Read what Sen. JD Vance had to say about DEI’s harmful agenda at this Senate link.
This year, two of the three parent representatives on the committee are also, in a nod to nepotism, spouses of school board members.
With roughly 12,000 students in the school districts, the spouses of School Board members Bobby Burgess (Kristen Schupp) and Meredith Maple (Kel Gitter) are the parent representatives on the DEI Committee.
At the group’s first meeting of the school year, Aug. 21, the committee breezed through the agenda at the school district offices.
The committee then adjourned and several committee members gathered at the offices of the Queer Collective.
Queer Collective is a foundation-funded organization that organizes events for the community. The director of the Queer Collective is also a member of the DEI committee.
Some of the Queer Collective projects it advertises on its website are:
Fairbanks Queer Youth Council
∙GSA Network Building & Support
∙Youth Leadership & Mentorship
∙Peer Education
& Free Fun Sober Youth Events for Queer Joy!
○ Quarterly free queer legal clinic & legal fund
○ Reoccurring Free Family-Friendly Events
○ Volunteer Outreach
○ Queer Winter Gatherings
○ Annual PRIDE Events
∙Gender Euphoria Party
∙Rainbow Picnic
∙Camp Queer
The DEI Committee trip to Queer Collective was not on the agenda, nor was it noticed on the agenda or in meeting materials.
The meeting at the Queer Collective was after the official meeting adjourned. Essentially, the group adjourned and then met at another location the public was not made aware of. According to witnesses, the attendees included April Scott, Kristen Schuppe, Erin Morotti, Kel Gitter, and Rinam Midelstat among others. These are all members of the DEI committee, and are clearly beyond the “three” allowed by the open meetings act. Since this is an official committee of the elected government of the school district, it is almost certainly subject to the Open Meetings Act. AS 44.62.310-.312.
If the meeting had been on the agenda and properly noticed, and if the committee meeting had been recessed and reconvened back on the record, and if a record of discussions by the clerk had been taken, this meeting could have been done legitimately.
One member who went to the meeting was aware of the Open Meetings Act, but thought it was OK because the Superintendent, Luke Minert, knew about the meeting after the meeting.
If that is the standard for the Open Meetings Act, then it’s been misunderstood for years. According to state statute, “governmental body” means an assembly, council, board commission, committee, or other similar body of a public entity with the authority to establish policies or make decisions for the public entity or with the authority to advise or make recommendations to the public entity.
The DEI committee is, indeed, an advisory committee to the FNSB school board, which makes policy for the school district. While there are carve outs of act for attending professional meetings, consideration of personnel matters, and legal matters, a private and non-publicly noticed trip to the Queer Collective does not meet that criteria.
Since there are no published notes of the meeting at the Queer Collective, it is unknown what decisions, if any, were made.
The Alaska Democratic Party issued a fundraising email over the weekend that all-but admits that ranked choice voting helps their candidate and hurts Republicans. They were dismayed that Nancy Dahlstrom dropped from the November ballot, and described it as an event that makes things tighter for Peltola.
The Democrats make it clear in their fundraising pitch that they didn’t want Mary Peltola to have to face Nick Begich without Nancy Dahlstrom draining votes, volunteers, and campaign contributions from him. The ranked choice system works for them, they’ve seen. “Things just got even closer!” was the subject line of the Democrats’ pitch for donations:
Screenshot of portion of fundraising pitch by Alaska Democratic Party.
When ranked-choice voting was first on the ballot in 2020, the Alaska Democratic Party opposed it publicly. But the party has seen how it works well for them in a state where there are multiple candidates on the Republican side, but where they can discipline their candidates to not compete against fellow Democrats — especially their incumbents.
This “things got closer” narrative is counter to the Democrats’ public proclamation that ranked-choice voting is good for all, no matter what their political affiliation.
Republicans outnumber Democrats in Alaska two to one, but with Alaska’s new open primary, there were four Republicans on the ballot for Congress. Ranked-choice voting robbed the Republicans from being able to advance their own candidates through a semi-open process they had before, where only Republicans or voters not affiliated with an actual party could help choose the Republican candidates for the general election.
Peltola in August was competing against a mostly conservative group of 11 other candidates, and she barely got more than 50% in an election that was largely ignored by voters — only 108,906 of 605,482 registered voters voted, for a turnout of 17.99%.
To be clear, with Alaska’s voter rolls inflated, the actual voter base could be less than 575,000 (based on the fact that in 2018, there were 566,790 registered voters in a population that was officially 736,624, and the state’s population has shrunk since then by about 3,000 and there are about 132,044 school-aged children in Alaska). But even if the actual voting base is 575,000 the turnout was still only about 19%.
Yet it’s clear the Democrats got their voters out, since they vastly over performed, having used a unified message around just one candidate. Republicans were splintered between two for the primary, but will not be hampered as much in the general election.
2024’s primary will go down — technically — as the third least-voted since 1974, but only because of the inflated voter rolls. The standing is muddy: What’s not available in the calculation is whether earlier years’ voter rolls were equally as inaccurate as the current claim that there are 605,482 actual living, eligible voters in Alaska.
On Nov. 5, voters will have an opportunity to get rid of ranked-choice voting with a “yes” vote on Ballot Measure 2.
Former Clinton Administration Labor Secretary Robert Reich has called for the arrest of the man who owns the majority shares of X/Twitter. Elon Musk must be stopped from providing free speech, he said..
Reich wrote Musk is “out of control,” in the Guardian newspaper.
“He may be the richest man in the world. He may own one of the world’s most influential social media platforms. But that doesn’t mean we’re powerless to stop him,” Reich wrote. Threatening him was arrest is just one of the things that the United States government can do to stop Musk from providing a free speech platform, he said.
The main offense by Musk is that he supports Donald Trump for president. Musk, a former Democrat who once supported Barack Obama, has since seen how Democrats in power suppressed free speech, especially evident during the 2020 presidential cycle, when the Democrats controlled Twitter.
“Elon Musk is rapidly transforming his enormous wealth – he’s the richest person in the world – into a huge source of unaccountable political power that’s now backing Trump and other authoritarians around the world,” Reich wrote.
“Musk owns X, formerly known as Twitter. He publicly endorsed Donald Trump last month. Before that, Musk helped form a pro-Trump super political action committee. Meanwhile, the former US president has revived his presence on the X platform,” Reich wrote.
Then, Reich stated something shocking to him, a Democrat: “Musk just hired a Republican operative with expertise in field organizing to help with get-out-the-vote efforts on behalf of Trump.” And even more shocking, Trump may work with Musk, if elected, to stand up a government efficiency commission.
“Trump and Musk have both floated the idea of governing together if Trump wins a second term. ‘I think it would be great to just have a government efficiency commission,’ Musk said in a conversation with Trump earlier this month streamed on X. ‘And I’d be happy to help out on such a commission.'”
Musk’s crime? Supporting a candidate for president. In the world of Democrats, this is a crime punishable by arrest and possible imprisonment, not unlike what the Democrats have already done to Trump himself, with multiple charges and court cases intended to prevent him from effectively running for president.
In France, authorities last week arrested the developer of another social media site, Telegram. In Brazil, authorities have said anyone caught using X/Twitter could face a daily fine of nearly $9,000 for every day that a citizen has been using X/Twitter. In Brazil, there are an estimated 22 million X users.
“Regulators around the world should threaten Musk with arrest if he doesn’t stop disseminating lies and hate on X,” Reich stated. He also called for a global boycott of Tesla and that advertisers pull their support of X.
“Global regulators may be on the way to doing this, as evidenced by the 24 August arrest in France of Pavel Durov, who founded the online communications tool Telegram, which French authorities have found complicit in hate crimes and disinformation. Like Musk, Durov has styled himself as a free speech absolutist,” Reich said.
The busiest U.S. Customs and Border Protection sector at the northern border continues to break records in apprehensions with foreign nationals coming from 85 countries to Canada to illegally enter the U.S.
In less than 10 months, Swanton Sector Border Patrol agents apprehended 15,000 foreign nationals from 85 countries who all illegally entered the U.S. through Canada, the greatest volume reported in this time period in history.
By contrast, the Swanton Sector apprehended 365 illegal border crossers in all of fiscal 2021, according to CBP data.
The total number apprehended this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, exceeds apprehensions Border Patrol agents made in 13 fiscal years combined (fiscal 2011 through fiscal 2023), Swanton Sector Chief Patrol Agent Robert Garcia said.
The 15,000 illegal border crossers is equivalent to 15 U.S. Army battalions.
Foreign nationals flew from 85 countries to eventually reach Canada and then make their way to the U.S. border, where they illegally entered the Swanton Sector. The sector includes all of Vermont, six upstate New York counties, and three New Hampshire counties.
It spans 295 miles of international boundary with the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Ontario and is the first international land boundary east of the Great Lakes.
In fiscal 2023, Swanton Sector Border Patrol agents broke previous records by apprehending the greatest number of illegal border crossers in history of more than 6,700 foreign nationals from 76 countries, The Center Square exclusively reported.
In just one year, that number tripled and countries of origin increased to 85.
Foreign nationals illegally entering the U.S. from Canada in the Swanton Sector alone are citizens of Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Angola, Anguilla, Argentina, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Cameroon, Canada, Chad, Chile, China, Colombia, Congo, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Hungry, India, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Liberia, Lithuania, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Nepal, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Sweden, Syria, Taiwan, Togo, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vietnam and Zimbabwe, according to Swanton Sector data.
The Biden-Harris administration continues to maintain U.S. borders are secure and numbers are down compared to the Trump administration, a claim fact-checked as false by The Center Square.
In one Derby, Vermont, local news report, residents described how “at all hours of the day,” illegal foreign nationals cross their backyards having come from Canada to illegally enter the U.S. They’ve shared similar experiences on a much smaller scale as those living in rural border counties of Texas, The Center Square has reported. In Texas, illegal border crossers total in the millions under the Biden-Harris administration, prompting 55 Texas counties to declare an invasion and 60 to issue disaster declarations citing the border crisis.
Like those at the southwest border, those at the northern border describe how home surveillance video captures foreign nationals trespassing on private property, next to their homes, in the middle of the night to be picked up by someone nearby. Border Patrol agents have warned residents “not to interfere because they may have weapons. They want to get through, they’re going to have nobody stopping them,” WCAX 3 News reported.
They are describing gotaways, those who illegally enter between ports of entry, don’t make asylum or immigration claims, and intentionally seek to evade capture. Many have criminal records and are armed and dangerous, authorities have told The Center Square. They total at least two million nationwide since fiscal 2021, the greatest number in recorded history, The Center Square first reported.
After the Seattle City Council imposed minimum wage laws that required delivery apps to pay drivers more, the food delivery business model for hundreds of gig workers in Seattle has all but vanished. The cost of delivery is now so great that people have changed their habits and are no longer ordering over the apps. Instead, they’re ordering food to-go and going to pick it up themselves.
Food delivery grew in popularity across the country during the Covid pandemic policies, which scared many people into not going out to eat, and which made economics of the restaurant and hospitality industries challenging. People started driving for extra dollars, sometimes as their chosen work, and other times to fill in between other jobs or gigs and earn extra money. People could make decent money on the tips alone.
In Seattle, the socialist-run city council put in a minimum wage rule that required the app companies to pay drivers $5 per order, or 44 cents per minute, and an additional 75 cents per mile. It was supposed to ensure that delivery drivers make the same as Seattle’s minimum wage of $19.97 per hour.
Immediately after the “PayUp law” went into effect in January, restaurants reported they had fewer orders. Drivers have quit driving as contract workers for new companies like GrubHub, Uber Eats, and Door Dash because they found they were losing money, with fewer and fewer customers.
In May, the city council was set to reconsider its actions, but as of Sept. 1, has taken no action, and has not scheduled any action in the future.
Seattle and New York City are the first two cities in the country to introduce such a minimum wage for contract drivers
One driver told the Seattle Times that she worked for five and a half hours, hanging around Belltown during what should have been a busy time for orders. Instead, she only was able to deliver two orders during that five and a half hours, for a total of 40 minutes of work. For her day of mostly waiting for orders, she made $23.71.
The owners of Spice Waala in the Capitol Hill neighborhood told a reporter that since the law took effect, delivery orders have declined 40%. It’s made his Indian Street food out of reach for the service. A kati roll used to cost a customer around $10, he said, and now it costs $20. Nobody is ordering them for delivery anymore.
I recall being just 14 years old when President Ronald Reagan delivered his iconic Labor Day address in 1984 from the Oval Office. Growing up in the glory days of Reaganomics, I witnessed firsthand how conservative policies led to a thriving economy where American workers and families flourished. Our nation enjoyed unprecedented growth, with both unemployment and inflation decreasing simultaneously for the first time since the Kennedy Administration.
Dubbed the “American Miracle,” Reaganomics was driven by the belief that “what is good for the American worker is good for America,” and that shaped my political values from an early age.
Forty years later, as we approach Labor Day weekend in 2024, we are presented with a pivotal moment. November’s election offers a choice that will shape our economic future. Labor Day is a time to celebrate the productivity and spirit of America’s working people, but also a moment to recognize the challenges we face, and to consider our role in steering America toward prosperity once again.
Currently, approximately 161 million Americans are employed, yet 7.2 million remain unemployed. This is a significant number, and it highlights the need for a change with policies that stimulate job growth and economic stability. Under President Joe Biden, the average inflation rate has soared to 5.7%, in contrast to the 1.9% average inflation rate under President Donald Trump.
These figures are not just statistics; they represent the daily struggles of American families facing skyrocketing grocery prices, highway robbery at the gas pumps, and being priced out of the housing market.
To navigate out of the economic downturn we face, we must adopt policies that stimulate growth and create jobs, like the historic tax cuts delivered during President Trump’s first term. We must bring back jobs that have been outsourced to countries like Mexico and China and bring our manufacturing home. Let’s become the economic powerhouse we once were and promote the production of American-made goods. We can no longer take the American worker for granted. This is not just about economic policy but about pride and belief in the American worker, the backbone of our communities.
Recently in an unprecedented move, President Trump opened the door for Teamsters President Sean O’Brien to address the Republic National Convention for the first time in the Teamsters 121-year history. The tides are changing as a groundswell of voices rise to preserve the American working class against gigantic multinational corporations. As O’Brien points out, “Remember, elites have no party, elites have no nations. Their loyalty is to the balance sheet and the stock price at the expense of the American worker.”
Sadly, it took a global pandemic for the elites to notice that the American worker is essential. We must not lose that perspective moving forward as we vote for policies that put the American worker first and reign in runaway national debt and inflation.”
The groundswell can be seen across the nation as the workforce demonstrates their priorities in this election. For example, despite the United Auto Workers endorsing the Harris campaign, there is contention between union officials and the auto workers who are on the plant floors. The “Auto Workers for Trump 2024” movement is gaining momentum, with workers planning to rally weekly at Detroit’s Big Three facilities through Election Day. They know that their jobs are on the line as a Harris/Walz administration would continue the current push to make gas vehicles obsolete by 2032, only eight years away.
Today’s working class feels the sting of “Bidenomics.” The dream of homeownership has become elusive, and the reality of affording basic necessities has become a burden for the average family. We all know that the system is broken. Yet, meaningful work—not government handouts—remains the hope of most Americans. We must foster an environment where the American Dream is accessible to all through free-market policies that limit government intervention, decrease and simplify taxes, and cut down on burdensome regulations.
I believe a strong workforce develops in the classroom. We must focus on revitalizing our education system to better prepare the next generation for the workforce. We need innovative educational reforms that encourage continued trade schools and develop better local vocational training opportunities for high school age students.
Unlike the new “Academies of Anchorage” in the Anchorage School District, we must ensure these initiatives are backed by data and effective research. For example, moving from six to eight class periods in the ASD Career Academies Master Plan might dilute core learning time, hindering students from obtaining the well-rounded education they need for college. How many of us chose our lifelong careers in ninth grade?
Rather, proven successful reforms like school choice are necessary, particularly as our state continues to rank among the lowest in educational performance. Our children are our future.
This Labor Day, we salute the workers of America, the backbone of our nation. As we celebrate the principles of freedom and take advantage of those sales that boost our local economies, let’s take a moment to remember those in countries where basic human rights and freedoms are still out of reach. We are fortunate to live in a nation where freedom prevails, but we must actively work to preserve it.
With the right leadership and policies, we can ensure that the spirit of American enterprise and the power of the American worker continue to thrive for generations to come.
As Ronald Reagan wisely said, “Let us in America be thankful for the strength of our free labor movement; may it long endure.”
Rep. Jamie Allard serves in the Alaska Legislature for Eagle River District 23 and was previously on the Anchorage Assembly.
Ethnic minorities, religious refugees, and other groups segregated by a dominant society have developed and implemented strategies and tactics to protect their national identity, religious practices, ancient traditions, and community cohesiveness.
In most cases, the tactics and strategies of these unique orthodox groups, created to secure cultural continuity and “living memory” among their members, have historic roots and have resulted from cognitive rational choices.
This process of assimilation in which an individual has changed so much as to become dissociated from the value system of his group, or in which the entire group disappears as an autonomously functioning social system is evident in today’s many ethnic minority, religious refugee, and immigrant groups in the United States, including Alaska, and, presumably, in other free democratic societies around the world.
“Dr. Jen Rose Smith is a young academic who has dedicated her early career to studying Arctic ice through the critical race theory lens of colonialism, white privilege and racism. On Aug. 30, the publicly-funded University of Alaska Southeast (UAS) will host Smith for its prestigious Egan Fall Lecture Series, where Smith will pontificate on her forthcoming book, ‘Ice Geographies: The Colonial Politics of Race and Indigeneity.’
“Like many emerging critical race theorists on the cultural left, Smith holds to the belief that racism, colonialism and white privilege lurk hidden in myriad corners of Western civilization, both past and present—even in our understanding of ice and kelp.”
I attended Smith’s presentation at the Egan Library in Juneau on Aug. 30. Indeed, not only are her ideas simply convoluted, but it is also false and poorly researched.
At the end of her presentation, I commented that about 15 years ago, the last fluent speaker (an elderly woman) of the Eyak language passed away. It was well documented by the Anchorage Daily News, Juneau Empire, several anthropologists in Alaska, etc.
Nevertheless, Dr. Smith was visibly offended by my comments, stating that, “It depends how you define a ‘speaker’ of languages.”
I responded that, “Speakers of languages communicate in full sentences and fluently convey messages to each other; not just limit their communication by saying ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’ or few other common words or expressions.”
I also argued that disappearance, revival and/or evolution of languages has only partially to do with colonization politics and influences of Western civilization; and many other factors and causes involved in cultural changes, including evolution, extinction and revival of languages.
For example, while in Alaska in the mid-19th century, Russian Orthodox Bishop Ivan Veniaminov learned the Aleut language, for which he invented an alphabet and charted a grammar.
However, Presbyterian missionaries in Alaska in the 19th and early 20th centuries were known for suppressing Native languages in Alaska, forcing Natives to speak only English.
Indeed, if languages of ethnic minorities are not institutionalized (the process of becoming a permanent or respected part of a society, system, and organization) or contribute very little to socio-economic development of the dominant culture, then those languages will eventually decline or become a symbolic representation of a given ethnic minority. It happened to many native languages in Siberia, Alaska, Africa, etc.
Yes, languages of ethnic minorities decline, change and become extinct every year worldwide. Typically, languages have become extinct because of the process of cultural assimilation leading to language shift, and the gradual abandonment of a native language in favor of a foreign lingua franca, largely those of European countries.
Israel’s revival of the authentic Hebrew language (a Semitic language—a subgroup of the Afro-Asiatic languages spoken across the Middle East) from 1948 (i.e., when Israel was re-established by the United Nations) has resulted in a gradual disappearance of the Yiddish language (West Germanic language) that was historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews of Eastern Europe.
In fact, Yiddish is a German dialect which integrates many languages, including German, Hebrew, Aramaic, and various Slavic and Romance languages. Today, Yiddish, a language of my parents and grandparents, is at the stage of extinction and its unfortunate destiny has nothing to do with colonial politics.
In her presentation, Smith argued that there are many speakers of the Eyak language left in Alaska.
Alaska Native Language Archive, however, describes it otherwise.
“Eyak is not an Athabaskan language, but a coordinate sub-branch to Athabaskan in the Athabaskan-Eyak branch of the Athabaskan-Eyak-Tlingit language family. Eyak was spoken in the 19th century from Yakutat along the south-central Alaska coast to Eyak at the Copper River delta, but by the 20th century only at Eyak. It is now represented by about 50 people but no surviving fluent speakers. With the passing of Marie Smith Jones on January 21, 2008, Eyak became the first Alaska Native language to become extinct in recent history.“
Frankly, most people in the audience could not understand Smith’s awkward concepts of ice, open space, and colonial politics. However, new UAS Chancellor Dr. Aparna Dileep-Nageswaran Palmer was delighted by Smith’s convoluted presentation.
In short, “Professor Jen Rose Smith” is a new version of the far-left woke ideology in our troubled country and a clear representation of the poor scholarship.
Alexander B. Dolitsky was born and raised in Kiev in the former Soviet Union. He received an M.A. in history from Kiev Pedagogical Institute, Ukraine, in 1976; an M.A. in anthropology and archaeology from Brown University in 1983; and was enroled in the Ph.D. program in Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College from 1983 to 1985, where he was also a lecturer in the Russian Center. In the U.S.S.R., he was a social studies teacher for three years, and an archaeologist for five years for the Ukranian Academy of Sciences. In 1978, he settled in the United States. Dolitsky visited Alaska for the first time in 1981, while conducting field research for graduate school at Brown. He lived first in Sitka in 1985 and then settled in Juneau in 1986. From 1985 to 1987, he was a U.S. Forest Service archaeologist and social scientist. He was an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Russian Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast from 1985 to 1999; Social Studies Instructor at the Alyeska Central School, Alaska Department of Education from 1988 to 2006; and has been the Director of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center (see www.aksrc.homestead.com) from 1990 to present. He has conducted about 30 field studies in various areas of the former Soviet Union (including Siberia), Central Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and the United States (including Alaska). Dolitsky has been a lecturer on the World Discoverer, Spirit of Oceanus, and Clipper Odyssey vessels in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. He was the Project Manager for the WWII Alaska-Siberia Lend Lease Memorial, which was erected in Fairbanks in 2006. He has published extensively in the fields of anthropology, history, archaeology, and ethnography. His more recent publications include Fairy Tales and Myths of the Bering Strait Chukchi, Ancient Tales of Kamchatka; Tales and Legends of the Yupik Eskimos of Siberia; Old Russia in Modern America: Russian Old Believers in Alaska; Allies in Wartime: The Alaska-Siberia Airway During WWII; Spirit of the Siberian Tiger: Folktales of the Russian Far East; Living Wisdom of the Far North: Tales and Legends from Chukotka and Alaska; Pipeline to Russia; The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in WWII; and Old Russia in Modern America: Living Traditions of the Russian Old Believers; Ancient Tales of Chukotka, and Ancient Tales of Kamchatka.
Scott Robb is certainly Alaska’s reining Cabbage King. He took home the blue ribbon Friday with a 97.35 pound cabbage at the 28th annual Gian Cabbage Weigh-off on Friday at the Alaska State Fair. Paul Dinkel and Keevan Dinkel won second and third place, respectively.
Robb set the world record at the fair in 2012, entering a 138.25-pound cabbage. Last year, after taking a few years off, he entered the competition again, and took home the blue ribbon during the 27th annual contest with a 113.5-pound wonder.
Club for Growth, a network of 500,000 pro-business Americans, has endorsed Nick Begich for Congress for Alaska.
“The Club for Growth is the leading free-enterprise advocacy group in the nation. We win tough battles and we have an enormous influence on economic policy,” the organization explains on its website. “In fact, we are the only organization that is willing and able to take on any Member of Congress on policy who fails to uphold basic economic conservative principles…regardless of party.”
The groupalso endorses candidates such as Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, Kari Lake for Senate in Arizona, and Bernie Moreno for Senate in Ohio.
By backing Nick Begich, the group is signaling it’s going to take on Rep. Mary Peltola, Alaska’s Democrat in Congress. The Nov. 5 general election is 66 days from Saturday.
” If elected, he will be dedicated to ensuring that Alaskans thrive, standing ready to challenge Washington’s overreach and secure a prosperous future for Alaska,” the organization said in its highlight of Begich.
The Club for Growth endorsement is one of the more difficult ones to get, because the group doesn’t endorse people who will just go along with the Washington, D.C. swamp politics. It’s not interested in lawmakers who cave to special-interest lobbyists.
Begich has received other endorsements this week, including that of Rep. Bruce Westerman, who chairs the House Natural Resources Committee, and Rep. Jim Jordan, chair of Judiciary. Begich was also just named to the National Republican Congressional Committee’s “Young Guns” program, which will super-charge his campaign.
