The First Dude Refuses to Testify
The former mob and terrorism prosecutor in charge of the TrooperGate cover-up, Ed O’Callaghan, has upped the ante. The McPalin campaign announced yesterday that Todd Palin will not respond to the legislature’s subpoena. It appears that the McPalin campaign did the math, and figured they could avoid any penalties for this contemptuous behavior by suddenly getting cooperative after the elections.
Todd, along with other witnesses, can stall without penalty for months, pushing this investigation well past election day. To bring contempt charges, which are punishable by a fine up to $500, or up to six months in jail, the full Legislature must be in session. That happens after Christmas.
Even assuming the campaign doesn’t catch heat for so obviously obstructing an investigation Sarah Palin once welcomed, I’m not convinced they’ve completely avoided any disclosures before election day. It seems that Steven Branchflower can still release an interim report.
Senate President Lyda Green, a Republican foe of Palin, said Wednesday that the investigation is still on track.
"The original purpose of the investigation was to bring out the truth. Nothing has changed," she said.
Without the testimony, the retired prosecutor hired to head the investigation could still release a report in October as scheduled, based on the evidence he’s already gathered. As of today, Steve Branchflower had interviewed or deposed 17 of the 33 people he had identified as potential witnesses in the probe. [my emphasis]
And it may be that Branchflower has enough already to really hurt Palin.
Note the timing of the McPalin’s recent ratcheting up of their cover-up:
August 30: McPalin campaign says Monegan’s firing was a budgetary disagreement
September 9: The Senior Assistant Attorney General Mike Barnhill agrees to allow state employees would have to testify if they are protected for prosecution for having looked at Wooten’s personnel file
September 10: Palin’s attorney Van Flein calls the investigation unconstitutional
September 12: Investigator Steven Branchflower presents case for subpoenas, including the necessity of subpoenaing Murlene Wilkes, state Workers Comp contractor
September 15: McPalin campaign fixer Ed O’Callaghan announces Palin will no longer cooperate with investigation, cites politicization
September 16: Attorney General un-recuses and reneges on the agreement to have the state employees testify, then leaves for a "vacation" in Kansas
September 17: O’Callaghan introduces new explanation for Monegan’s firing: insubordination and "rogue mentality"
September 18: Todd Palin refuses to testify
You see, I think there has been a shift in the McPalin campaign’s response to the investigation, and it involves more than just Palin’s selection as the VP candidate. Since then, there has been a ratcheting up, with Van Flein first, on his own, trying to undercut a perfectly legal investigation> But things went still further when O’Callaghan took a more active role. With O’Callaghan, we’ve seen two new approaches: direct attacks on Monegan’s credibility, an apparent attempt (one we saw in the US Attorney purge) to find a legitimate reason to fire Monegan. In addition, O’Callaghan has implemented a strategy that puts off the disclosure of evidence in this case (that is, the legislature can eventually force Todd Palin and state employees to testify, but not for several months).
Now, the change may well derive from O’Callaghan’s legal analysis of the situation, an assessment that the investigation was perfectly legal, and therefore a determination that the best approach was to delay by ignoring the subpoenas.
But I can’t help but wonder whether the campaign adopted this new approach when Branchflower announced that he believes Murlene Wilkes, the state contractor who was pressured to deny Wooten’s Workers Comp claim, lied when he interviewed her. After all, with Branchflower’s suggestion that Wilkes had financial incentive to lie to him, he suggested that the Palin team may have (and I stress "may," since the financial incentive may have been entirely unspoken) broken the law during its cover-up.
It’s not the crime that takes down politicians, after all, it’s the cover-up. And I’m wondering if the McPalin team just realized that.
Does the Alaska constitution give it’s legislature the power of inherent contempt?
The problem is that the legislature is out of session, which is why a subcommittee of the legislature is dealing with it. It’s not clear they have the ability to enforce the subpoenas without calling the full legislture back.
Perhaps some pressure on the Alaska state legislature, such as a petition from the lower 48 plus HI ? Otherwise, Alaska gets to deal with millions of US voters holding the state responsible for putting a crook, liar and more of the same into office without any accountability for her behavior. The Alaska legislature owes it to the entire nation at this point and if that cannot be understood then there is a bigger problem. The petition should point out that the State Personnel Board investigation does not allow for avoiding a conflict of interest due to their board appointment being made by Governor Palin.
That said, call the Alaska legislature back through external pressure.
Doesn’t this reek of a modern day Spiro Agnew…
She may have to resign if elected, but the Repugs won’t care… he
will put in Lieberman (perfect)
A win-win for McCain.
It would be interesting to overlay dates of the emails with the VP talking points and her willingness to originally assist with the investigation. Where was the McPalin Camp then?
Nowhere. Doing nada.
Thanks for this timeline EW.
Great work.
I am still in awe of McCain’s mavericky decision to be the first major party candidate to select a VP running mate that is mired in an ethics investigation. The cover up appears to be making things worse in the sense that McPalin is being exposed for fighting this so hard (the lady does protest too much!). I have no doubt McPalin will manage to kick investigation to next year and eliminate the prospect of a negative report (at least a complete one) coming out before election, but the questions are: will the damage already be done and will the tradMed continue to cover the cover-up?
I would love to hear these questions from Jim Lehrer: Sen. McCain, you vetted Gov. Palin before selecting her and knew that this investigation was going on and had a report due before the election, why is your campaign working so hard to derail the investigation if you do not believe Gov. Palin did anything wrong? Wouldn’t Gov. Palin’s name be cleared by the bi-partisan investigation if she indeed has nothing to hide and did no wrong?
This ticket has surely made history, the oldest major party candidate to ever try to be elected President, the first GOP ticket with a woman (sick) VP, and the first ever major party ticket with the VP candidate under and active/current ethics investigation. How do we fight such history making ticket? With the first african american President.
You don’t need the constitution to give the legislature that power. That’s what makes it inherent.
A subpoena isn’t a subpoena if there isn’t an independent mechanism of enforcement. It may not be the preferred method, but unless an independent method exists, it’s not a subpoena, it’s an invitation.
As long as the Palin’s hired (but free!) gun is going to force this into untested territory anyway, might as well jump in with both feet. The Alaska Legislative Council should hold them in inherent contempt and issue arrest warrants for the witnesses.
Wouldn’t the Alaska State Troopers like to be deputized by the Sergeant at Arms to arrest the guy who thinks he can bully them and fire them at will?
If we’re going to court to test novel theories about subpoena power, let’s go there to ask the question of whether Todd Palin is a fugitive from justice, too, and not just the dry toast of whether the Legislative Council has subpoena power. That’s a boring (and easy) question. It does.
Nice point. Unfortunately, it looks like the Alaska legislature is cowardly. Kind of like Congress.
OT…
That mother-fucker McCain just made an ad hominen attack on
Obama’s integrity (Green Bay)
He must be desperate.
How on earth can the McCain campaign believe the garbage it is putting out:
Sounds great, doesn’t it? But from the very same article:
That’s right, the “unbiased, legally appropriate and independent investigation” is to be carried out by three political appointees she put into office. That sounds fair, doesn’t it?
Once again, the loudest protestations from the Republicans are projection. They accuse a bipartisan group of a politicized investigation and then try to substitute a politicized investigation to be carreid out by people she appointed.
At least even AP sees through this one.
But you see they get the “she’s cooperating” sound bite. And for so very long that’s all they’ve needed to the low info voters from breaking out the pitchforks.
I think that there’s something more than a stonewall going on here. If they just wanted to stonewall, they could do it a lot more quietly. What’s going on is a full court press to undermine the legitimacy the entire investigation. That’s a strategy that only makes sense if they know there is damning evidence already in the hands of the investigator.
I agree. What kind of counter-strategy would work?
This answer may not be popular here, but I think Obama’s best strategy right now is to do nothing. Reacting helps McCain by reinforcing the ‘partisan witchhunt’ narrative. Let Isikoff amplify the local Alaska noise about this.
Now, there are some subtle things that Biden can do to encourage the press feeding frenzy. Start talking about the US Attorney purge in the stump speech. Make an issue of Republican selective prosecutions. The trick is to make the narrative broader than ‘Troopergate’ so that when the facts come out, Palin and McCain look like Bush Republicans.
I agree with you on what Obama and Biden should do. However, the electorate deserve answers before voting in the national election. And those answers need to come from an environment void of political appointees.
Agree. When they started to invoke McCarthy, it became clear they knwo they’re in trouble.
What it is doing is now trying to create a precedent just like Bush/Cheney have created for the Fed, that places the executive above and beyond the law and beyond investigation. Palin, et al, are seeking to extend that precedent to governors now.
Thanks to Congress simply allowing subpoenas to be ignored without consequence, it is likely to work. We wont just have a dictator in DC, we will also have 50 little Mooselini’s all over the country too.
Monegan’s got the e-mails. It’s clear that she was trying to get Wooten fired. The only thing that isn’t 100% clear from the e-mails (I’d say we’re at about 95% clear on this part.) is that she fired Monegan BECAUSE he wouldn’t fire Wooten.
The only way they can make this stonewall work is if they can buy off Monegan, and that’s where they get stuck. They have to claim they fired him for something that SOUNDS reasonable, but they also have to keep him from coming forward and calling bullshit in order to clear his name.
What all this tells me is that, henceforth, we can ALL ignore subpoenas. Since the President, VP, any and all their staffers or friends, a mere governor, any and all her staffers, friends, family can ignore subpoenas simply because they don’t like them, then we can ALL ignore them.
I almost wish I would be subpoenaed over something so I can exercise this new right. I would simply refuse to obey the subpoena because it inconvenienced me, or maybe endangers me, or simply because I didn’t have my morning coffee the day it arrived.
Goose, Gander. Good for one, good for the other. No special privileges or special persons with special dispensations. Ignoring subpoenas is now for ALL Americans.
The vp candidate and the people who selected her for McCain seem already well-primed to carry on as they do now in the Blight House, if
selected as the seem confident they are destined to be. It just screams, more of the same, this GOP campaign.Can the average citizen now start avoiding subpeonas by claiming equal protection.
I mean if they don’t apply to Rove, Meiers, Palin, why do they apply to anyone?
-G
Legislatures are toothless when it comes to subpoena power.
The question has occurred to me as to how much of the strategizing of this pushback against the legislative Troopergate investigation is coming from the McCain campaign organization per se, and how much it’s being directed by the party poobahs at GOP Central Command. For that matter, to what degree did the latter influence the selection of Palin in the first place, and what might knowledge of these facts tell us what might be expected of a McCain administration. Especially, to what degree will McCain the “reformer” be leaned upon to toe the Party Line in opposition to whatever of his alleged reform instincts might remain, if any. It seems to me that somewhere in here is the makings of an effective framing strategy.
I just have to say that I sure hope Branchflower does not meet with an untimely end… I think this is the kind of thing that causes that, particularly when you are dealing with power hungry people.
In addition, O’Callaghan has implemented a strategy that puts off the disclosure of evidence in this case (that is, the legislature can eventually force Todd Palin and state employees to testify, but not for several months).
This I don’t understand. If you have the power to force someone to testify in several months, then you also have power to force them to testify NOW. Why is there a magic “several months” in there? What is this delayed power nonsense? Why can’t it be compelled sooner rather than later?
I assume that was a rhetorical joke?
Hey EW
I googled “Palin investigates self” and came up with this interesting blog by mudflats. have you seen it?
What strikes me about Palin is how she conducts herself just like Rove when dealing with Congress. Oh, I’ll volunteer for a little off the record chat. I won’t tell you anything, but your questions will tell me what you know.
she’s shrewd even if she isn’t bright. there’s a difference.
This I don’t understand. If you have the power to force someone to testify in several months, then you also have power to force them to testify NOW. Why is there a magic “several months” in there? What is this delayed power nonsense? Why can’t it be compelled sooner rather than later?
Witnesses who refuse to testify can be found in contempt under Alaska law. But the full Legislature must be in session, which won’t happen until January. That means witnesses can stonewall without penalty beyond the Nov. 4 election, lawmakers said.
A special session could be forced. Secondly, there is at least a cognizable argument that a criminal charge could be filed without a contempt finding. Lastly, the “legislative council” should use it’s quasi-plenary powers while the legislature is not in full session to make provisions for enforcement.