Anchorage Daily News

U.S. Senate campaigns in Alaska are gearing up for what's expected to a monumental election contest.

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Mike Tibbles

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Republican Sen. Ted Stevens said Monday that his campaign manager will be Mike Tibbles, who resigned recently as Gov. Sarah Palin's chief of staff. And Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich, a Democrat who is running for Stevens' seat, will begin today running the first of his campaign's television ads.

Stevens sent out a statement saying Tibbles "brings a wealth of campaign experience to our team."

"He has an intimate knowledge of our state's history and present challenges we face," Stevens said. "He is battle-tested, and his organization skills are first-rate. This will serve us well as we prepare for an intense campaign season."

Tibbles worked as a deputy campaign manager on Frank Murkowski's successful 2002 campaign for governor. He was also legislative liaison and deputy commissioner of administration under Murkowski.

Tibbles then left the Murkowski administration to run John Binkley's 2006 campaign for governor. After Binkley lost in the Republican primary, he joined Sarah Palin's campaign for governor.

Tibbles led Palin's transition team after she was elected. He was her chief of staff before resigning abruptly about two months ago.

Tibbles said Monday "it got to the point where I wanted to take a break and make a little shift in my life, so I left."

He said there wasn't any bad incident with Palin and believes they're on good terms.

Tibbles, who lives in Juneau, said he took time off to be with his family after leaving the Palin job and started volunteering on the Stevens campaign in Southeast. Stevens then asked him to run his statewide campaign, based in Anchorage.

"I thought about that, long and hard," Tibbles said Monday. "And I just thought, you know what, I feel so strongly that we need to keep him in the Senate, especially now, with so much potential in front of us but some real concern out there regarding energy and economy and the future of jobs in this state."

Energy is also the theme of one of the TV ads Begich will start running today. It's a 30-second spot in which he says, "In addition to ANWR, we have more wind, hydro, geothermal and tidal energy than anyplace else. We should be using it."

Begich will also start running a 60-second ad that begins with Walter Cronkite talking about the 1972 disappearance of his father, then-Alaska Congressman Nick Begich, on a flight between Anchorage and Juneau in a plane that was also carrying Louisiana Congressman Hale Boggs, who was House majority leader.

The ad also talks about Begich's time as Anchorage mayor and makes a reference to ending "secret deals for special interests."

Begich told reporters Monday that, when he travels outside of Anchorage, "people know the name, they know of me, they want to know more about me."

The ads will run in the Anchorage, Fairbanks and Juneau markets. The Begich campaign wouldn't say how much they cost. It's an early example of what will likely be a multimillion-dollar onslaught of advertising in the race before the election. The Stevens campaign said it hasn't determined when it will start its TV ads.

David Cuddy, running against Stevens in the Republican primary, has already run a couple of television ads and formally kicked off his campaign last week.

Find Sean Cockerham online at adn.com/contact/scockerham or call him at 257-4344.

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