By SALLY DUNCAN
I attended what I believed to be a town hall hosted for Sen. Dan Sullivan last week, based on a flyer I saw circulating. As a conservative, I was curious to hear from my senator and engage in a productive conversation with fellow constituents. However, what I walked into was not a town hall, but rather a protest against the very man I came to hear from.
It looked like a standard town hall event: It was advertised at theNoel Wien Public Library’s auditorium in Fairbanks, the location and time seemed to line up. But upon arrival, the scene was anything but what I had expected. Instead of a discussion about policy or the senator’s actions, there was a palpable energy of frustration and dissent.
An empty chair was placed at the front, a symbol of Sen. Sullivan’s absence, though no one took ownership of the event. A young lady approached me, holding a piece of paper with a QR code, asking if I wanted to stay updated on similar events. When I asked her who was organizing the event, she replied with a cryptic response: “There is a different person that takes that responsibility each time so that we don’t get targeted.” I
couldn’t help but find the irony striking. A group of about 125-150 people, gathered in what seemed to be a safe space for free speech, were apparently so fearful of backlash that they couldn’t even publicly claim responsibility for hosting the event?
The flyer in question, which I later discovered had been posted on the Native Movement website and their recent newsletter, described the event as an “Empty Chair Town Hall.”
In this instance, the event was framed as a way to hold Senator Sullivan accountable for declining the invitation to attend the meeting. Did he really decline, was he really asked/invited or demanded of?
This “Empty Chair” event was a missed opportunity, a chance for people to vent their frustrations (real or imagined or made up) without offering real solutions. This event, far from facilitating a thoughtful exchange of ideas, seemed more like a performance aimed at making a point rather than fostering understanding.
Do we get to hold them accountable for a “fake” townhall?
Sally Duncan is from Two Rivers, Alaska.
Never, ever, vote for a Democrat or “Independent”, this example is the mentality score of between 0-1 on a scale of 10.
Thank you Sally for this informative report. More deceptive behavior from the left.
Hm. I’d like to know if Dan Sullivan was actually invited.
A fake town hall for fake people
Sally–Senator Sullivan acknowledged that he had been invited to the Fairbanks town hall, and that he declined the invitation.
Do you have a link to a press release or some other such document stating such? I’d love to see it.
Fake town hall meetings have become another lefty (failed) plan.
KUAC.ORG has an article up about this “Town Hall”, written by “Robyne”. A person named Kelly Barker is quoted as saying “One person said we should do a town hall since Republicans are being told not to hold them and we should hold one and let’s invite Senator Sullivan.” “And they (Sullivan’s office) said ‘well, he won’t be there.’ And the response was, well, we’re gonna hold it anyway” .
The article also lists one Sarah Garland as a speaker at the event. There happens to be a professor at UAF named Sarah Garland…. This event was completely fake. False advertising. Apparently this is a trend around the country.
I attended the town hall as well. Suffice to say any constituent of Sen. Sullivan should be expressing some frustration with the Senator. Last couple of days has put the top military and intelligence people of the Trump administration, that Sen Sullivan voted to confirm, on public record, to be as bad as we feared. Best I can say is it was a good thing that Jeffery Goldberg at least had some journalistic integrity and didn’t pull a National Inquirer and kill the story.
So Sen. Sullivan thought there was no problem confirming Pete Hegseth, Tulsi Gabbard, Mike Walz? These people can’t answer questions straight. Jeffery Goldberg had to publish what he saw in this Signal message thread to verify that Signal was being used to discuss classified level information. But Tulsi just spits out Manchurian Candidate mindless responses? “There was no classified material discussed in these texts”.
You don’t have to be left wing, to know that what the Trump administration is doing, with Doge, is making some of the stupidest personnel cuts, most illegal, and Dan, being our Senator, being silent, being a no show, is concerning. The freezing of federal funding is going to hurt Alaska, just by delays in construction projects. The tariff fight with Canada, and the hap-hazard detentions of Canadian citizens, causing the Canadian government to issue travel warnings to their citizens against travel to the US, is going to affect our tourist visitation.
Cutting and dicing up the government, to save money, was tried by our own Governor Dunleavy, with disastrous results, highways being closed mid winter because DOT budget slashed to the bone, the gutting of the University system, but two examples. Trump isn’t doing us any favors with his chainsaw wielding idiot Musk running/not running Doge.
So, yeah, would have been nice to be able to raise concerns directly with the Senator, but he didn’t show, when he could have.
Republican senators and representatives have been instructed not to hold town hall meetings because they are not being met with favorable audiences. Telling.