Murkowski and Kavanaugh

            I have attempted to convince Alaskans to boot Lisa Murkowski out of office for two election cycles. Many other Alaskans feel as I do about Murkowski. She is in office simply because her father, former Senator and then-Governor Frank Murkowski, appointed his daughter to his old Senate seat.

            My daughter has met Murkowski and likes her as a person as well as a Senator. I value my daughter’s opinion because she travels throughout the state and knows many politicians. However, she has not been able to sway my opinion of Murkowski. My daughter is a Democrat, and most Democrats approve of Murkowski because of the way she votes. Murkowski votes with the Democrats on the big issues like the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

            Murkowski’s vote against Kavanaugh and for mob rule may cost her. Conservatives in Alaska may be ready to vote her out of office after she fell for the Kavanaugh circus. Tuckerman Babcock says that he was “surprised” with Murkowski’s vote, and he seems to be upset about it. 

It’s significant enough that I’m going to convene the whole state central committee, which is about 80 grassroots volunteers around the state, and we’ll start drafting what our response should be.

            There is a possibility that the Alaska Republican party leaders will reprimand Murkowski for her vote. There is also a possibility that they will withdraw support for her, seek a replacement, or even ask that she not seek re-election as a Republican.

            Murkowski is not up for re-election until 2022, four years from now. A lot can happen in that time. Some people say that the party should not push her because she might cross the aisle and become a Democrat. I do not think that she will because she knows that she has little or no hope of being re-elected in Alaska as a Democrat.  Otherwise, she might have switched parties in 2010 when she lost the Republican vote.

            In 2010 Republicans selected Joe Miller as their Senate candidate. Murkowski chose to run a write-in campaign and won the election with the help of Democrats from Bush Alaska. There were Republicans who voted for Murkowski because they considered Miller to be too far right. Those Republicans, plus the Natives, carried her back into office. The Alaskan Natives voted for her because she convinced the Alaska Natives that they would lose benefits if she was not in office.

            Alaska is a solid red state, and Murkowski is not the darling of conservatives. This may not be the time, but one day she will be held accountable for her liberal politics. Even my daughter, a faithful supporter of the Senator, said that Murkowski took the coward’s way out by not voting at all in the final confirmation of Kavanaugh. I can only hope that I will live to see the day that Murkowski is no longer a Senator from Alaska!