A lawsuit that played a central role in derailing the citizen-led effort to repeal ranked-choice voting in Alaska has ended in a $50,000 settlement to the trio who were trying to repeal the unique and confusing voting system in 2024.
Arthur Mathias, Phillip Izon, and Jamie Donley, sponsors of the repeal effort, sought attorney fees and costs from the people who were pawns of the anti-repeal side: Elizabeth Medicine Crow, Amber Lee, and Kevin McGee, the three who challenged the validity of petition signatures.
The Supreme Court had last month ruled in favor of both the way the Division of Elections handled the repeal petitions and the actions of petitioners themselves.
The lawsuit was part of a series of harassing legal filings and appeals targeting the repeal campaign’s petition process. The challenges, and subsequent court proceedings, consumed months of time and energy and imposed heavy legal costs on the repeal sponsors — just as was intended by the money-rich opponents of the repeal effort.
To settle the matter, the challengers agreed to pay the repeal petition sponsors a total of $50,000, funds that went to the repeal group’s lawyer Kevin Clarkson. The two groups settled out of court.
As part of the resolution, both sides agreed to dismiss appeals with prejudice. The sponsors of the petition also agreed not to renew their request for attorney’s fees in appeal S-19182 after the Alaska Supreme Court issues its final ruling. Each party will bear its own remaining legal expenses, and no side admitted wrongdoing or liability as part of the settlement.
The harassing lawsuit, brought by Democrat attorney Scott Kendall, the architect of Ballot Measure 2, which established ranked-choice voting in Alaska, was widely seen as a form of lawfare, strategically aimed at derailing the repeal campaign.
Kendall, an ally of Sen. Lisa Murkowski who was working with the dark-money group Alaskans for Better Elections, sought to preserve the voting system he had helped create to get Murkowski re-elected.
Opponents of ranked-choice voting say the lawsuit was intended not just to question petition signatures, but to distract, exhaust, and financially damage the sponsors in the midst of a critical repeal effort.
Ultimately, Ballot Measure 2 was kept in practice by a narrow margin, a result repeal advocates say was influenced in large part by the aggressive legal assault and public confusion stemming from the Kendall group’s law fare campaign.
Should have been $5,000,000.
Make sure you sign the new RCV repeal petition.
“Kendall, an ally of Sen. Lisa Murkowski…” I knew Kendall was a rat. Ever since the company I work for invited him in to discuss Ranked Choice Voting, I knew he was a rat. Arm in arm with Lisa, makes him a double rat. I live for the day he’s shamed into leaving town, with Lisa in tow, for parts south, never to return again.
I should now file a lawsuit against Kendall for harassing me! I was one of the people who went out and collected signatures to get RCV repealed on the ballot. Lucky me, I was called by Kendall and he disposed me. He wanted a lot of personal information. It made me angry that he is against the citizenry choosing to petition its government. He was using a threat of lawsuit and degradation against those of us exercising our right to gather signatures.
Too bad they couldn’t hang in there and get a lot more. These lawfare practicioners need a serious whipping.