Legal News

Sarah Palin: ?Too Much Smarts to Hitch Her Wagon to a Mule??

By Jennifer Forsyth

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, in need of a new Attorney General, tapped her former campaign chairman and attorney, Wayne Anthony Ross.

He replaces Talis Colberg, who resigned Feb. 10 citing a “harsh political climate” after some claimed he tried to derail an state investigation of Palin’s role in “Troopergate.” (Palin, the 2008 Republican VP nominee, was investigated for allegedly pressuring the state’s public safety commissioner to fire a state trooper involved in a bitter divorce with Palin’s sister. Legislators in Alaska accused Colberg of trying to protect Palin by quashing subpoenas of state employees in connection with the investigation, according to this report on Legal Newsline.)

Ross (Marquette Law) is one of those outsized personalities, best suited to the wide-open spaces of Texas or Alaska. According to this story in the Anchorage Daily News, Ross, a lifelong Catholic, is anti-death penalty and anti-abortion. He’s a founding member of Alaska Right to Life and has been knighted by the Vatican. “I feel I have a good relationship with the good Lord (but) if I could overturn Roe vs. Wade, I figure I got my ticket,” he once told a reporter.

A director of the National Rifle Association, Ross’s hero is Theodore Roosevelt — he used to list his political affiliation as “one of the last of the Teddy Roosevelt BullMooser’s.” The Anchorage Daily News says his red Hummer has a personalized license tag that says “WAR.”

According to the Daily News, Ross became friends with Palin during the 2002 election, when he was running in the Republican primary for governor and Palin was a candidate for lieutenant governor. He remembers putting out feelers about whether they might run as a team. “She had too much smarts to hitch her wagon to a mule that wasn’t going to go anywhere,” Ross joked.

Palin didn’t win that time but was appointed to the state Oil and Gas Commission. When she pursued an ethics case against fellow commissioner Randy Ruedrich, chairman of the Alaska Republican Party, Ross was her attorney.

Ross will still have to be confirmed by the state legislature. This report by KTVA says the hearing may have some fireworks.

Photo:AP

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 27, 2009 (boomark / email).