Project Veritas Action has published a third undercover video inside Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s campaign offices that shows a staff member admitting that the “dark money” messaging was a cover that was used to promote Ballot Measure 2, when in actuality the primary purpose of the ballot measure was to help Murkowski in 2022.
Josiah Nash, the Murkowski campaign interior coordinator, was recorded saying it would be “bad” for “Lisa if the other campaigns start highlighting it [dark money messaging].”
Nash said, “We messaged for ‘dirty money’ and we knew that that was something that specifically resonated with Alaska. And we could say, yeah, this goes in with voting reform and so, if people accepted that enough then the vote can pass.”
Nash said that voters just don’t pay attention to such details.
“Most people, you know, aren’t into politics as probably as much as we are, and so they don’t look for this stuff. Where it would be an issue is if the MAGA people and Kelly Tshibaka started [highlighting this] as a major part of their campaign.”
Emma Ashlock, campaign coordinator, was caught also featured in these new recordings discussing a Political Action Committee “which is kind of an outside funding source” that supports Senator Murkowski.
Ballot Measure 2 was passed by voters in 2020. It created some transparency for campaign funding, but not for funding of ballot initiatives such as Ballot Measure 2. It also redesigned the voting structure in Alaska, removing the ability of Republicans to have their own primary ballot. Instead, all candidates are on one “jungle primary” ballot. In the general election, the list of candidates is whittled to four, and voters rank them in what’s known as “ranked choice voting.” Such a system of jungle primary and ranked choice general has not been tried in any other state and is being tried for the first time in the special election to fill the empty congressional seat. On Tuesday, Aug. 16, voters will rank three finalists: Nick Begich, Sarah Palin, and Mary Peltola.
