Accusation by leftists that some members of Congress supported an “insurrection” on Jan. 6, 2021 in the U.S. Capitol was deflated in a Georgia court on Friday, which cleared Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican, to run for a second term.
Judge Charles Beaudrot said Friday that the group, “Free Speech for People,” which brought the lawsuit, did not prove in any way that Greene had engaged in an insurrection, nor did she take part in plotting any attack on the Capitol.
Beaudrot said that Greene’s words were protected by the First Amendment and did not represent an attempt to overthrow the government.
In Alaska, leftists in the Alaska House of Representatives have sought to sanction Rep. David Eastman because he attended the Jan. 6, 2021 rally outside the Capitol, and had listened to the speech by former President Donald Trump.
As recent as January, Democrats in the House were trying to punish Eastman because he is a member of the Oath Keepers, whose leader has been arrested in connection with a breach of the U.S. Capitol during a protest that turned riotous.
“I think what we’ve been learning about Rep. Eastman is extremely concerning. And I think it needs to be addressed. We at least need to look into it as a Legislature and figure out what action is warranted,” said Rep. Calvin Schrage, to the Associated Press. Many a caucus meeting by the Democrats focused on what could be done about Eastman.
“This membership in the Oath Keepers is troubling,” said Rep. Matt Claman, an Anchorage Democrat, to the AP.
Schrage and Claman might take a page from what has just happened in Georgia, and earlier what happened when a similar effort was made to block Rep. Madison Cawthorn, a Republican from North Carolina, from being able to run again. He has also been cleared. The Free Speech for the People group similarly tried to keep Reps. Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar, both of Arizona, from being able to run again because of things they said related to Jan. 6, 2021. The attempts to remove these Republicans from office is based on a loose interpretation of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which says those who took an oath to the Constitution, and then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” may not hold office.
Ballots arrived last weekend in most mailboxes in Alaska. The election to find a temporary replacement for Alaska’s congressional seat has begun in earnest. A collection of observations from the week of campaigns:
Voted already: By Thursday afternoon, the Division of Elections had processed 4,988 ballots. The division hasn’t counted them but has logged them in as received. Over 555,000 ballots were mailed hither and yon.
Tara Sweeney: The candidate for U.S. House said she is pro-life and also libertarian concerning abortion on the Must Read Alaska Show, and then said she is pro-choice on a social media post. We’re confused but we think this means she is really pro-choice:
Josh Revak: In what looked like a cry for help, congressional candidate Revak attacked Santa Claus and called him a “commie” and a fraud. It did not go well with some viewers who said it seemed mean. “Don’t let this commie steal Santa’s valor. Vote freedom, vote Revak,” he said. And that was just the beginning of the sniping.
Chris Constant, running for Congress as a Democrat, decided to publicize the Must Read Alaska story about his new draft ordinance giving him the power to remove the mayor of Anchorage.
On Instagram, he did a little “Is this play about us?” meme. Cheap publicity and going for a certain generation and HBO crowd with a TikTok theme.
Sarah Palin: The former governor was in Bethel Friday as the only non-Native at a campaign forum at the Long House Hotel, sponsored by Bethel Native Corporation. The forum also had Mary Peltola, Emil Notti, and Tara Sweeney as invited guests — all running for Congress. It appears Palin knows she will be in the top four for the Aug. 16 ballot and is now running for that ballot by checking off the “Bethel visit” box now, rather than later. The other three in the forum are battling for fourth place at this point in the campaign.
Palin still running anti-Republican: Palin’s online posts are still largely anti-Republican, a theme she began when she did not receive, by acclamation, the Republican Party’s endorsement last month.
Santa Claus: The North Pole councilman running for Congress for the temporary seat will be on the Must Read Alaska Show podcast on Monday.
John Coghill: The former state senator has hired Cherie Curry and Chuck Kopp’s Winfluence consulting company to help him with his campaign. Look for him on a Must Read Alaska Show very soon.
Mary Peltola: Alyse Galvin, who ran for Congress twice, has endorsed Democrat Peltola, and Galvin’s finance director in the 2020 cycle is Peltola’s campaign manager: Kim Jones, partner at Ship Creek Group.
Chris Constant, right, with Forrest Dunbar. The two masked men are on the Anchorage Assembly.
Chris Constant: A video ad by Chris Constant features him and fellow Democrat Assemblyman Forrest Dunbar wearing masks. Constant’s mask appears to have his name on it and the logo for his congressional campaign, but looks ineffective and the circle around his mouth makes him look like he is screaming.
Some of the 48 candidates who hope to replace Don Young in Congress.
Nine of 48: A handful of the 48 candidates attended the virtual forum at UAF this week in Fairbanks, sponsored by Associated Students of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Senate. The students invited all 48 candidates. By and large these forums are a waste of time for candidates, but this was on Zoom for most of them. Al Gross went to UAF to appear in person.
Radio spot: Nick Begich released his first radio ad, where he emphasized that he would not be a “quitter,” a thinly veiled reference to Sarah Palin. Listen to it here on Facebookif you don’t have a radio. Palin released a video on Facebooksaying she is in this “for the long haul.” Nick released aFacebook video as well.
A decent crowd gathered in Soldotna for the Nick Begich fundraiser on Thursday.
Nick Begich: #PickNick had a fundraiser at Mels Bakery in Soldotna; 45 people attended, including a Washington Post reporter; spotted were Richard Derkevorkian, Bill Elam, and Wayne Ogle, all on the Kenai Borough Assembly, and Tuckerman Babcock, running for state Senate.
A sprinkling of lobbyists for Josh Revak for Congress at the Crystal Saloon. Less than 10 people went to his fundraiser in Juneau on Wednesday.
Josh Revak: At the Crystal Saloon on Front Street in Juneau (old Viking Lounge, old Percy’s Cafe), about 10 politicos showed up for a fundraiser for Josh Revak. Most were lobbyists and legislative aides. Spotted: Rep. James Kaufman, likely to replace Revak in the Senate if the chips fall his way.
Andrew Halcro: The vainglorious gadfly used his podcast to attack Nick Begich. But it appears the Anchorage Daily News has dropped Halcro as a content provider as it is no longer hosting his caustic podcast on its front page. He seems to have disappeared, as a result.
Jeff Lowenfels: In addition to doing the UAF forum, he is still writing a column for the Anchorage Daily News. Lowenfels has radio ads galore on all the main stations. The only others with radio ads right now appear to be Nick Begich and Tara Sweeney, through the independent expenditure group, Alaskans for Tara.
Events: The Kenai Republican’s Club booth at the Kenai Sports and Rec Trade Show featured both Nick Begich and Gov. Mike Dunleavy. Spotted at the show was Rep. Ron Gillham, Senate candidate Tuckerman Babcock, gubernatorial candidate Charlie Pierce, Marilyn Hueper (wife of lieutenant governor candidate Paul Hueper for candidate Chris Kurka), and Gov. Mike Dunleavy.
Nick Begich and Tara Sweeney: The two joined the Alaska Miners Association meeting on Friday morning to discuss their respective campaigns.
Santa Claus has something in common with the late Congressman Don Young — he is in favor of the PRO Act.
Santa Claus: He’s getting those national news stories, and a lot of people on Twitter are saying they are going to vote for him. Tune in Monday to the Must Read Alaska Show, when we’ll ask him if he is really a “commie,” as characterized by one of his competitors.
Endorsements: Mat-Su Valley Districts 25 and 26 Republican committees made several endorsements, including Kelly Tshibaka for Senate, Nick Begich for House, Shelley Hughes for State Senate, and DeLena Johnson and Cathy Tilton for Alaska House of Representatives on Thursday.
Gov. Mike Dunleavy was in Houston, Texas this week for fundraiser and then flew back to be at the Kenai Sports and Rec Trade Show. He has a new campaign headquarters — the old Alaskans for Don Young office on Fairbanks Street near Fireweed Lane.
Check back in a couple of days for another edition of “Notes from the campaign trail.”
Forty-seven Alaska Airlines flights were canceled on Friday, about 6 percent of all flights. Ninety-seven, or 13 percent of the company’s remaining flights have been delayed on Friday.
The airlines has been struggling to hire employees since March, and flight cancellations have been the norm for the airlines for well over a month. Tens of thousands of passengers have been delayed or stranded by missed connections, as the company can’t find enough pilots and is beginning to simply cancel entire routes as a result.
For Saturday, May 7, some 26 flights have already been canceled by Alaska Airlines, a disappointment for travelers heading home for Mothers Day weekend. And for Sunday, 18 flights have already been cancelled.
Alaska Airlines pilots have a strike vote beginning Monday and closing on May 25, after contract negotiations between pilots and the company have stood at an impasse for two years. The Air Line Pilots Association began picketing, staging the largest picket of the group’s history on April 1 at several Alaska Airlines hubs around the west.
The Anchorage School Board’s selection for the new superintendent doesn’t meet the minimum criteria.
The State of Alaska requires a superintendent to have a minimum of three years teaching. Yet Jharrett Bryantt, the incoming superintendent, only has two years of classroom teaching.
This requirement is spelled out in Alaska Administrative Code 4 AAC 12.345, which states the minimum experience requirements as follows:
(A) for a superintendent endorsement, at least five years of satisfactory employment as a teacher or administrator, with a minimum of
(i) three years of employment as a teacher in an elementary or secondary program with a teacher certificate under 4 AAC 12.305.
Bryantt only has two years teaching experience, according to his resume. It is difficult to understand how the board and its search contractor, Ray &Associates Inc., could have missed this minimum criterion.
Even more amazing is how Dr. Bryantt, the current human resources director for the Houston Independent School District, did not recognize the minimum personnel requirement in the job listing.
Now it is up to the ASD Board and the State Department of Education & Early Development to determine if Dr. Bryantt meets the minimum qualifications or needs a waiver.
But this minimum requirement should not be waived, some argue. Minimum requirements are just that — the bare minimum. If a waiver is granted, the integrity of the entire selection process comes into question.
The other two candidate finalists, who met the minimum teaching requirement, also have a case against the district. They were not selected over a candidate that did not meet the minimum requirements.
The district also surveyed the public and ASD employees to determine their priorities in selecting a new superintendent. The number one priority for teachers, parents and support staff was “Has classroom experience in a K-12 setting.”
Administrators ranked classroom experience as their third highest priority; students ranked it as their fourth highest priority. There were 31 various qualities/characteristics ranked; classroom experience was near the top.
Here is the entire chart showing the qualities/characteristics of a new superintendent, the rankings, and the various responding groups in the district survey, which was self-selected in terms of participation. The highlighted items are those that the board was recommended to use ins its selection process.
Note that item 23, “Is able to lead district diversity, equity and inclusion efforts,” only ranked in the middle of the group.
Most of these highlighted items are what a leader should possess. What we don’t know is if the board used these items in its selection process.
The integrity of the selection process is called into question by this finding. Was the process valid or was it slanted to get a certain candidate? Will the Department of Education and Early Development be persuaded to waive a minimum requirement or adhere to its criteria?
David Boye is former executive director of Alaska Policy Forum and is Must Read Alaska’s education writer.
The Alaska House has passed HB 104, suspending a tax on motor fuels until the middle of 2023.
This is exactly the opposite result the bill started out to accomplish.
Originally, HB 104 was going to double the tax on gas. It was proposed by Rep. Andy Josephson, with co-sponsors Reps. Grier Hopkins, Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, Cal Schrage, and Harriet Drummond, all part of the Democrat-dominated caucus.
Alaska has an 8 cents tax on every gallon of gas. Josephson and his co-sponsored sought to increase the tax to 16 cents because, as he pointed out in his sponsor statement, it had not been changed for many years.
It was gutted in committee and amended on the House floor. If passed by the Senate, the 8 cent tax will be suspended through June 30, 2023.
The bill is in Senate Transportation Committee, where it will be heard on May 10 at 1:30 pm. Information at this link. Its only other referral is Senate Finance Committee. The Legislature must gavel out on May 18 or go into special session.
States Newsroom, a new approach billionaires on the Left have devised for controlling the media narrative, will launch its Alaska website next week. It’s called Alaska Beacon, similar to the names of the others in the nonprofit reporting network around the United States — Maine Beacon, New Hampshire Bulletin, Arizona Mirror, and others. The list is at this link.
The Alaska Beacon will serve up daily news on its website and a newsletter. Like its brethren fake-neutral news groups in several states, it is funded by philanthropic interests on a mission to reshape the political narrative for specific political agendas. Reporters for the Alaska Beacon are Andrew Kitchenman, who left Alaska Public Media to lead the newsroom, Yereth Rosen, who left Arctic Today, James Brooks, who comes from the Anchorage Daily News, and Lisa Phu, former public information officer for the City of Juneau. The four will make up the largest political reporting staff in the state, with traditional newspapers continuing their slow collapse.
The Anchorage Daily News, Alaska’s largest daily newspaper, is also being propped up by left-leaning philanthropic interests, with reporters salaries now being paid in part by ProPublica and Report for America.
For the Alaska Beacon, Rosen will cover political news from Anchorage, while Kitchenman, Brooks, and Phu are based in the capital city.
The States Newsroom characterizes itself as an unbiased news source but is ideologically driven and backed by some of the biggest names in dark money in politics, including the Arabella Advisors, the Hopewell Fund, and others who have given to the nonprofit.
One of the organization’s pillar projects is called “The Big Lie,” documenting a political belief that divides many Americans — whether or not Joe Biden legitimately won the 2022 election.
The mothership of the Alaska Beacon considers it a lie that Biden did not win the election and seeks to document questions about the election in the framework of “baseless conspiracy theories without evidence.”
Another key focus of the States Newsroom network is to push Critical Race Theory, under the banner of stopping the “sterilization of history.” The description of the project shows a perspective that conservatives are trying to distort history, chill free speech, and promote ignorance:
The news organization also takes a point-of-view news perspective on abortion, casting it as a fundamental human right:
States Newsroom is tax-exempt and was listed by the Nieman Foundation for Journalism as a collection of “hyper partisan sites … masquerading as local news.”
Although supported by extreme leftists, the Alaska Beacon promotes itself as a “trusted news source for state government and politics news.”
According to the site: “Experienced Beacon journalists will report on what state leaders are doing and how it affects the lives of Alaskans. The team will track policies on everything from climate change to criminal justice. We’ll shine a light on state government to make it more accessible to you.”
An ordinance offered by Anchorage Assembly Vice Chairman Chris Constant has a new section of the city code that gives it broad authority and a legal path to remove the mayor from office.
The ordinance, AO 2022-60 will be introduced at the May 10 meeting of the Anchorage Assembly. It has a list of offenses that, if the mayor breaches, can lead to removal by a vote of two-thirds of the Assembly. Those include acceptance of cash gifts from one doing business with the municipality, perjury, falsification of records, filing false reports, nepotism, making personal use of municipal or school district property, destruction of public property, official oppression, actual or attempted official misconduct, ordering a municipal employee or contractor employed by the supervisory board to undertake an unlawful act, or substantial breach of a statutory, code, or charter-imposed duty.
The draft ordinance appears to have been written by a former official of the Ethan Berkowitz Administration, Bill Falsey, who is now contracted with the Anchorage Assembly to provide additional legal services not being provided by the city’s Department of Law or the Assembly’s attorney Dean Gates.
Removal procedures would begin with an accusation that would be delivered to the Municipal Clerk, who works exclusively for the Assembly. The accusation would need only a majority of the Assembly and must have specific actions listed that breach the public trust. The accusation would then go to the Municipal Attorney or a special counsel hired by the Assembly, aka Bill Falsey, and, if found sufficient, the Assembly would employ a hearing officer to conduct an inquisition. Upon the recommendation of the hearing officer to remove or not remove the mayor, the Assembly could vote to remove the mayor.
The mayor would then have the ability to challenge the ruling in Superior Court, but in the meantime, the Assembly could install its own mayor seven days after the Assembly decision, unless the judge issues a stay. The Assembly says this action will not constitute “irreparable harm” and says the mayor’s seat may still be temporarily filled pending the outcome of the court case, even if the judge issues a stay.
The Assembly already had in place methods to remove members of the Assembly for cause. The new section allows it broad authority over the mayor and his staff. The mayor was sworn in less a year ago after winning a race against Assemblyman Forrest Dunbar.
For example, last year when the mayor had the fluoride temporarily shut off because of employee complaints about burning sensations, the Assembly claimed it was against city code. They could have initiated the removal of the mayor, even though the fluoride was turned back on within hours. The Assembly is also saying that if the mayor doesn’t spend all the money the Assembly appropriates, that could be grounds for removal. This makes the mayor a puppet of the Assembly, rather than the executive of the city.
The new section of city code is in Section 3 of this draft ordinance:
An international computer hacking collective that calls itself “Anonymous” threatened the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday, saying if the court strikes down the 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion ruling, it should be ready to “get burned.”
On Twitter, Anonymous said the Supreme Court and Republicans themselves should expect retaliation.
“Repealing Roe v Wade isn’t going to go the way SCOTUS or the GOP thinks it’s going to go. Play with fire, get burned. Don’t say we didn’t warn you,” the hacking group wrote. “Expect us.”
On Monday, a draft of the decision by the Supreme Court to roll back Roe v. Wade and send the authority back to the states to govern abortion was made public to Politico, a news website. Since then, abortion news has dominated the news cycle, with some people upset about the reversal, others elated, and many concerned that the lead of the document was intended to foment social unrest in advance of the midterm elections.
Sarah Palin announced the endorsement of Bikers for Trump Alaska on Wednesday.
“Bikers reflect the independent spirit of Alaska. They’re salt of the earth people, and I’m proud to have their endorsement,” Palin said. “I’ll take an endorsement like this one over the endorsement of establishment elitists any day.”
Palin, a former governor of Alaska and former mayor of Wasilla, has also been endorsed by Donald Trump.
“The Alaska Group of Bikers for Trump was thrilled at the announcement and endorsement,” Bikers for Trump said in its message. “We’ve seen your desire for our state and it is our great hope to see you Make Alaska Great Again!”
Last summer, the biker group endorsed Kelly Tshibaka for Senate against Sen. Lisa Murkowski.
