SENATE SEAT L SWAMPED BY BIG LABOR
Five days before the Alaska Primary (Aug. 16), and you’ll need a shovel every time you empty your mailbox in some districts across the state, where there are full trees-worth of flyers spilling out onto the street.
Campaign materials are coming in hot on an increasingly short election runway.
In the South Anchorage race for District L Senate, Big Labor is all over Rep. Craig Johnson as he runs for Senate to replace Lesil McGuire.
And when we say all over him, we mean they are firing more artillery than we’ve ever seen in any Senate race in Alaska. This is the most blatant effort by Labor ever to jump in and sway Republican primary voters, and is a harbinger of what we may see this fall.
Big Labor is spending what appears to be tens of thousands of dollars in District L, doing polling, voter identification, and mailers.
As mentioned here before, Robin Brena is the surrogate for Governor Bill Walker in this effort. Meanwhile, the governor has been up on Kotzebue, campaigning for Dean Westlake in his fight to unseat fellow Democrat Ben Nageak.
Here’s what ADN reporter Nat Herz posted on Twitter, showcasing the mob-boss tactics being employed by the Together for Alaska political action committee, dominated by $100,000 in seed money by the top three groups listed by Herz:
Prime mover behind this effort is Democrat Vinnie-the-Boss Beltrami, who is running against another senator, Cathy Giessel. Vinnie will appear on the November ballot as a newly minted independent. With Vinnie is Democrat Luke Hopkins, who is running against Sen. John Coghill of Fairbanks.
The cross-pollination between Big Labor and the Democrats is nothing to sneeze at, as they inject themselves into the Republican Primary.
Here’s the counterpunch from Craig Johnson:
DISTRICT 9 – THEY MIGHT BE HEROES
While Sutton resident George Rauscher tries to unseat Palmer pol Jim Colver for his House seat, Colver is running a postcard out there that brands him as a super hero. Readers have sent in their thoughts that “Colver misspelled the word ‘offender'”.
RAUSHER WINS MR. CONGENIALITY AWARD
But it looks like George Rauscher is sticking to the issues with this postcard that went out, with the endorsement of Alaska Outdoor Council guy Rod Arno and talking about access for hunters and ATVers.
GATTIS TAKES THE PRIZE
The winner this week is Rep. Lynn Gattis, who published this “keeper” postcard, which should be enshrined in a museum somewhere. It is at least suitable for framing:
Simple, effective, and cuts to the chase. Gattis may win her quest for Senate, but she is a mile ahead of the others in her gold-medal messaging.
Talk about sticking the landing.