Alaska - Walker, Mallott join forces in governor's race (expanded from last night's news)

[Blue_In_AK]

http://www.adn.com/article/20140901/walker-mallott-join-forces-governors-race

The Alaska Democratic Party broke with long tradition Monday when its central committee voted 89-2 to not field a gubernatorial ticket and instead put its weight behind the independent campaign of Bill Walker and Byron Mallott.

The vote to support the fusion ticket was contingent on Walker dropping his Republican Party affiliation. Mallott will quit as the Democratic Party’s nominee for governor, as will his running mate, state Sen. Hollis French. But Mallott will remain a Democrat, executive director Kay Brown said after the vote at party headquarters in a Spenard bungalow.

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The resolution passed by the central committee calls on the party to not replace Mallott and French when they officially withdraw on Tuesday. It also directs the party to throw its full support behind the independent “Alaska First Unity ticket” of Walker for governor and Mallott for lieutenant governor, something the party could do under its rules only if Walker wasn’t registered with another party.

The vote took place after Walker and Mallott formally agreed to merge their campaigns following days of negotiations. The agreement required the lieutenant governor candidates for both men to withdraw -- French as the Democrat and Craig Fleener as Walker’s running mate.

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I'm still processing this and am not entirely happy with the situation, but it's imperative that we deny Sean Parnell (Sarah's successor who has made all of us kind of miss her) another four years, but with a three-way race, he was almost guaranteed a win. Walker was leading Mallott in the polls and has made promises to accept Medicaid expansion, something that Parnell has absolutely refused to do, and to veto any restrictive social bills that might come out of the legislature, despite his own personal anti-choice positions. We shall see. He will be watched closely.

As I've said often, politics here is seldom boring, and maybe we can show the Lower 48 that true bipartisanship and cooperation can work. We can hope.