Politics

Echoes from 2014 US Senate race are heard in Anchorage mayoral race

Echoes of the 2014 U.S. Senate election are reverberating in the Anchorage mayoral race, from endorsements to campaign staffers and volunteers.

On Thursday, Republican Senate candidates Joe Miller and Mead Treadwell formally endorsed Anchorage Assembly member Amy Demboski for mayor. Miller, a tea party favorite, and Treadwell, a former Republican lieutenant governor, both lost a contentious Republican primary battle to Dan Sullivan.

In the statement, Treadwell referred to Demboski as "the only true conservative in the race." Miller said she would bring "fiscal sanity" to the mayor's office.

As well as Miller and Treadwell's support, Demboski has also attracted staff from both of their Senate campaigns. Her only paid staffer, Matt Johnson, was Joe Miller's campaign manager. For Demboski, he's in charge of coordinating volunteers.

Demboski's campaign manager, Cale Green, worked as Treadwell's political director. Demboski said some of her volunteers worked for Sullivan, who won the U.S. Senate seat.

"We really have had this collision of all the different candidates," Demboski said in a phone interview Thursday. "It's really entertaining … some of them just came off races where they were working against each other.

"To put them all in the same room, it was interesting," she added.

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Senate campaign crossover is also visible in Ethan Berkowitz's mayoral campaign, with two paid Berkowitz staffers coming from the campaign of former U.S. Sen. Mark Begich, who lost to Sullivan. Berkowitz's campaign manager, Susanne Fleek-Green, also worked as campaign manager for Begich. Berkowitz's communications officer, Nora Morse, worked as a researcher for Begich.

"I wanted people that had run campaigns, but who also knew a lot about the city," Berkowitz said.

None of the paid staff for other leading mayoral candidates helped run Senate campaigns last fall; Andrew Halcro said most of his staff and inner volunteer circle have never worked on a political campaign before. Halcro's campaign manager, Carrigan Grigsby, is his nephew and a commercial real estate broker who most recently helped Halcro on his 2006 gubernatorial campaign.

Halcro said he tries to surround himself with people who "bring strengths to my weaknesses."

"Just hiring people who have been around politics their whole life … that doesn't really give you a clear view," Halcro said.

Another frontrunner, Dan Coffey, said neither of his two paid staff worked on the Senate election. One of his two staffers, Donna Folger, is his wife's cousin.

Coffey said he wasn't sure whether any of his volunteers had also helped out on Senate races, but he said it's "certainly a possibility." He said he didn't get involved in either congressional election, for the U.S. Senate or U.S. House, adding that he's just interested in "local stuff."

"The political group … there's not a whole lot of people," Coffey said. "So a lot of people that do that then do it for somebody else."

On endorsements, Coffey's campaign says he's backed by past Republican mayors Tom Fink and George Wuerch, in addition to current Mayor Dan Sullivan.

Neither Sen. Dan Sullivan nor Begich have offered endorsements in the race.

Devin Kelly

Devin Kelly was an ADN staff reporter.

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