Troopergate Report: Palin Abused Power
Unanimous but Contentious Vote to Release the Report to the Public
By JUSTIN ROOD

Oct. 10, 2008—


Sarah Palin abused her power when she fired her Public Safety
Commissioner this July, a state investigation has concluded.

The Alaska legislature voted to release the several hundred page report
on the "Troopergate" scandal, a state kerfuffle which has come to haunt
Gov. Sarah Palin's vice presidential bid. The scandal centered around
her firing of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan. Monegan and
others believed Palin fired him because he refused to take action
against Mike Wooten, a state trooper under him who had been involved in
a messy divorce with Palin's sister, Molly.

The investigator, Stephen Branchflower, found that Monegan's refusal to
fire Wooten "was not the sole reason" but was "likely a contributing
factor" to his firing.

Branchflower also said Palin's attorney general failed to provide him
with emails of Palin's that he had requested as part of the probe.

The 14-member, Republican-dominated Legislative Council met in closed
session this morning with Branchflower. After seven hours of exhaustive
review, the legislators voted unanimously to release the report to the
public.

"I'm going to vote to release it, but it's not a vote in total
agreement," said Republican Sen. Gary Stevens.

"There's not a consensus for the conclusion," said GOP Rep. Bill
Stoltze. He said he expected there would be "robust and vigorous
intellectual debate on that in other corners."

Stoltze said he had received hundreds of e-mails from all over the
country calling for the public release of the report. The state added
extra servers to handle the traffic expected when the report is posted
electronically to the legislature's Web site.

The Legislative Council voted unanimously to initiate the investigation
in late July, shortly after Palin fired Monegan . The probe was to
determine whether she fired Monegan because he refused to take action
against a state trooper who had been through a messy divorce from
Palin's sister.

Palin denied wrongdoing and initially voiced support for the
investigation. But after she joined the national Republican ticket, she
and her supporters said the legislature had no right to investigate her,
and accused legislators involved in the probe of supporting Democratic
Sen. Barack Obama's presidential bid.

A lawsuit to stop the probe, which echoed many of the campaign's
charges, was thrown out yesterday by the state Supreme Court.

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