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Palin Refuses to Meet with TrooperGate Investigators

By Jeralyn

Sen. John McCain's campaign today announced Gov. Sarah Palin will not meet with the investigators in TrooperGate. Previously she said she welcomed the investigation and would cooperate.

The fired public safety official, Walter Monegan, is speaking out.

"She's not telling the truth when she told ABC neither she nor her husband pressured me to fire Trooper Wooten," said Walt Monegan, the Alaskan official whose dismissal by Sarah Palin is the focus of a state investigation known as "Troopergate". "And she's not telling the truth to the media about her reasons for firing me."

He'll be on Rachel Maddow's show tonight. (Update below the fold)

CNN's Randi Kaye had a great taped segment on Campabell Brown's show tonight with FactCheck.Org on Palin's distortion of her record and accomplishments. I'm going to try and find a video of it, it was one of the most comprehensive exposing of the untruths I've seen yet. Hopefully they may replay it.

Walter Monegan on Rachel Maddow (my live notes):

Palin didn't say he should fire trooper Mike Wooten in those words. But she repeatedly told Monegan he wasn't fit to be a trooper and clearly inferred it.

In Jan. 2007 her husband came to him and said he wanted to tell him what kind of character he had working for him, and that he had documents, pictures, etc. He continued this until Feb. 2008.

The Palins also got other commissioners to call him as well as other members of his staff.

He says the only reason for her to do it that way -- inferring it rather than directing him outright -- was because she and her husband knew what they were doing was wrong.

What about her claim he was fired for job performance? He's disappointed to hear that,because he did not know why he was fired. The night it happened, he was left scratching his head. He's now come to conclusion from listening to her increasingly expanding list of reasons that she's not telling the real reason.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on September 15, 2008 (boomark / email).