Alaska Dispatch

By Tony Hopfinger

Walt Monegan, the former public safety commissioner that Sarah Palin fired, says Todd Palin’s statement in the Troopergate investigation backs up what he’s said all along: The First Dude was obsessed with seeing his trooper ex-brother-in-law canned.

“Todd says (in his statement) that he’s been campaigning on that for years,” Monegan said in a phone interview Thursday with AlaskaDispatch.com. “I think he had a kind of obsession with it.”

Todd Palin agreed this week to cooperate in a legislative investigation into Governor Palin’s firing of Monegan on July 11 and whether she abused her power. Monegan alleges Sarah Palin took the action after he resisted pressure to fire Trooper Mike Wooten, who was involved in a contentious divorce and custody battle from the governor's sister. Wooten is still a trooper.

In a 25-page statement turned over Wednesday to an investigator hired by state lawmakers to probe Monegan’s firing, Todd Palin says, “I had hundreds of conversations and communications about Trooper Wooten over the last several years with my family, with friends, with colleagues, and with just about everyone I could, including government officials.”

Todd Palin admits in his statement that after the governor took office in late 2006 he began telling Monegan and other state officials he thought Wooten was dangerous and unfit to serve, but says he never pressured Monegan to fire the trooper. Sarah Palin has said she never pressured Monegan and that she dismissed him over budgetary disagreements.

Monegan says he and others in the Public Safety Department had numerous conversations with the Palins and the governor’s aides over the couple’s concerns with Wooten. Wooten had been disciplined for misconduct reported by the Palin family before Sarah was elected governor. Monegan concluded the matter had been resolved.

The question on Monegan’s mind now is who was the thrust behind the effort to have Wooten fired?

“When I was contacted by the attorney general, or Annette Kreitzer, or (Mike) Tibbles, who was the instigator of that?” Monegan wonders. “Somebody actually had to set that up. Who leaned to make them call me? Was it Sarah? Was it staff? Was it Todd?”

Todd Palin argues in his statement that his family’s concerns with Wooten went unaddressed and that he believes the Public Safety Department was looking out for one of its own.

Monegan disagrees and said he actually working on a new effort to bring better oversight to investigate allegations of trooper misconduct in his agency. He said he proposed in spring to create an internal affairs unit, something that hasn’t existed. The unit would review allegations of misconduct by officers, instead of relying on troopers investigating their fellow officers. The Alaska Legislature this year funded one of two positions Monegan proposed, he said.

In his statement, Todd Palin also levels other allegations against the Department of Public Safety, showing that there was a growing rift between the agency and the governor’s administration.

For example, Todd Palin claims the agency didn’t always make available its turbo-prop airplane to Sarah Palin and her staff for her travel, supposedly because the department was unhappy that the governor sold the state’s jet.

The jet, purchased by former Governor Frank Murkowski, had become a symbol of the failures of his administration. Palin sold it for a loss after she was elected, a populist move that helped strengthen her reputation as a reformer.

Monegan says Todd Palin is flat wrong, however. Before he was fired, Monegan said his staff produced statistics to the governor’s office detailing usage of the turbo-prop plane.

The governor’s office used it about 40 percent, the state Corrections Department 40 percent to transport prisoners, and the other 20 percent of time was split between Public Safety staff and the National Marine Fisheries Service, which contracted the plane for patrolling fisheries, according to Monegan.

The governor would have had two twin-engine airplanes available had Murkowski never bought the jet. One of the twin-turbo props was sold to help pay for Murkowski’s jet and was never replaced after Palin sold it, Monegan said.

State investigation to conclude Friday

The release of Todd Palin’s statement comes one day before a legislative report is due on whether Governor Palin abused her power by firing Monegan. Barring a potential last-minute ruling by the Alaska Supreme Court to suspend the investigation (UPDATE: the higher court rejected a bid by Republicans to block the probe mid-Thursday), the report will be delivered to the Alaska Legislative Council at 9 a.m. Friday.

The Legislative Council, a bipartisan committee of 14 lawmakers that conducts business when the full Legislature isn't in session, voted unanimously on July 31 to launch the probe.

Palin and the McCain campaign say the legislative probe is politically biased. She is cooperating with a separate investigation conducted by the state Personnel Board and has agreed to be questioned within two weeks as part of that inquiry. No deadline has been announced in that investigation.

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