Once again, the moment has arrived for TheCenterLane.com to present its Jackass of The Year Award. Our 2010 recipient is Alaska’s Senatorial candidate, Joe Miller.
Joe Miller’s campaign to defeat Senator Lisa Murkowski in Alaska’s 2010 Republican Primary got a big boost when Governor Sarah Palin decided to leave office to become a full-time celebrity. Palin’s decision was immediately criticized by Senator Murkowski. Palin responded to the criticism by endorsing Murkowski’s opponent in the Republican Primary: Joe Miller. Miller then won the support of the Tea Party Express, who – according to The Washington Post – spent more than $150,000 on pro-Miller television and radio ads during the week before the primary. In addition to the mobilization of the Tea Party activists, Miller benefited from an initiative on the Alaska Republican Primary ballot requiring parental consent before a girl aged 17 or younger could receive an abortion. Alaska’s most conservative voters were out in force on Primary Day. The Washington Post article highlighted some of Miller’s positions that helped him curry favor with Alaska’s “hard right” voters:
He has called for phasing out Medicare and Social Security, as well as eliminating the Education Department because it is not mandated in the Constitution.
Never mind the fact that neither the FBI nor the Department of Homeland Security has been mandated by the Constitution. The “lack of a Constitutional mandate” litmus test is only applied to those bureaucracies considered repugnant to Joe Miller.
Because the deadline for filing as an “Independent” candidate on Alaska’s November (general election) ballot had already expired by the August 24 primary, it was necessary for Lisa Murkowski to run as a “write-in” candidate in order to retain her Senate seat.
During the course of the ensuing campaign, Miller’s foolishness provided the news media with plenty of entertainment. Despite Miller’s rhetoric, which called for limited government and fiscal restraint, Anne Applebaum of Slate recalled that Miller’s background became an issue in the campaign, since it was so inconsistent with that of a Tea Party hero:
During the course of the campaign, it also emerged that he had once collected farm subsidies; that his wife had once collected unemployment benefits; and that his family had received state health benefits.
Upon hearing that Murkowski would not abandon her quest to retain her Senate seat after her Republican Primary defeat, Mr. Miller immediately made a foolish statement, which he attempted to blame on an unidentified staffer. Jim Carlton of the Washington Wire blog provided this quote of the now-infamous message sent out from Joe Miller’s Twitter account:
“What’s the difference between selling out your party’s values and the world’s oldest profession?” said the message under Mr. Miller’s Twitter address early Friday.
Mr. Miller said the tweet was sent by a staffer who was temporarily manning his account. He added that the remark was aimed not at the senator herself, but at suggestions that Alaska’s Libertarian Party might allow Ms. Murkowski to run under its banner in November if she ends up losing to him in a final count of absentee ballots.
He blamed the tweet on “poor judgment” by the unidentified staffer, who he “relieved of his duties.” He said he quickly removed the message from his Twitter feed.
If Miller had not already done enough to alienate female voters — his Halloween-themed campaign ad, likening Lisa Murkowski to a witch, immediately drew the ire of the New Agenda website, which embedded a YouTube feed of the ad in this posting.
The most infamous event of Miller’s campaign occurred on October 17, when Tony Hopfinger, editor of the Alaska Dispatch website was handcuffed by Miller’s private security guards, when he attempted to interview the candidate at the conclusion of a “town hall” meeting at the Central Middle School in Anchorage. The incident caused Miller to become the butt of many jokes on national television.
Hopfinger was attempting to question Miller about an incident that had become the subject of an e-mail that had originated a few days earlier from Mike Rostad, a Republican activist in Kodiak, Alaska, based on a discussion between Rostad and Miller’s father, Rex Miller. The Anchorage Daily News provided this report:
Joe Miller was a part-time Fairbanks North Star Borough attorney in 2008 when he led an attempt to oust state Republican Party chief Randy Ruedrich. Rostad wrote in the email that Rex Miller told him there was a poll being conducted during that effort against Ruedrich. Rostad wrote that Rex Miller told him what happened:
“One noon hour, on his own time at the borough, Joe participated in an online poll voting against Randy. He used four office computers in the office to do it, thinking this was his chance to boost numbers to get rid of Randy. He emptied the cache files on the computers so the users wouldn’t know what he had done. When the users asked what had happened to their caches, (Miller) admitted to what he did. He was reprimanded and docked in pay for several days, but was not suspended or fired.
Miller’s improper computer use as a part-time attorney for the Fairbanks North Star Borough has been an ongoing controversy, which was the subject of this December 31 article from the Anchorage Daily News.
The handcuffing of Tony Hopfinger was not the only misstep by Joe Miller’s campaign on October 17. Shira Toplitz of Politico reported on October 29 that the Murkowski campaign was running an ad, critical of two October 17 blunders:
The same night as the incident with the journalist, Miller told an audience that if “East Germany could, we could” secure the borders of the country — a controversial statement that Murkowski also uses in the new spot.
“Joe Miller’s answer to illegal immigration: Use East Germany as an example,” continues the narrator. “Exactly what kind of America does Joe Miller live in? . . .”
Miller had nobody else to blame for his stupid remark exalting East Germany as a model for border security.
Once it became obvious that Lisa Murkowski made history as the first write-in candidate to win a Senate election since Strom Thurmond in 1954, Joe Miller took his battle to the courts. He initially filed an action in Federal Court, although U.S. District Judge Ralph Beistline stayed proceedings pending resolution of the dispute in the State court, where the action should have been brought. Once the case was filed in the State Court, Judge William Carey dismissed the suit and it was appealed directly to the Alaska Supreme Court. U.S. News reported that when the ballots were still being counted, the Miller camp was determined to turn the election into a spelling bee:
Shortly after the second day of write-in ballot counting began on Thursday, a Miller observer challenged a vote for Murkowski that appeared to have her name spelled and printed correctly, though the “L” in “Lisa” was in cursive handwriting. Later, at least 10 ballots in which Murkowski’s name appeared readable were challenged, including one in which the vote read: “Lisa Murkowski Republican.”
Miller’s campaign said observers are simply challenging votes that don’t meet the strict letter of the law — including those with minor misspellings of Murkowski’s name or those with legibility or penmanship issues.
In addition to the “spelling bee” demand, Miller also attempted to pursue a claim of misconduct by election officials amounting to election fraud. The Christian Science Monitor provided this report on Judge Carey’s dismissal of that count:
“Nowhere does Miller provide facts showing a genuine issue of fraud or election official misfeasance,” Carey wrote. “Instead, the majority of the problematic statements included in the affidavits are inadmissible hearsay, speculation, and occasional complaints of sarcasm expressed by [elections] workers. Nothing rises to the level showing genuine material facts of fraud.”
The stupidity of Miller’s “spelling bee” requirement became more apparent once the Alaska Supreme Court was asked to reverse the dismissal of that claim. During oral arguments, Justice Dana Fabe directed a Why are you here? question to Miller’s attorneys. Here’s how that moment was described by KTUU News:
With unofficial results showing Miller behind Murkowski by 10,328 votes, or 2,169 when ballots challenged by Miller observers are excluded, Justice Dana Fabe asked Miller’s legal team what — if any — impact the court’s decision would have on the outcome of the election.
“Even if you win on this argument and every one of the challenged ballots is set aside, it makes no difference in this count, and it makes no difference in the outcome of this election unless you win on one of your other counts — isn’t that correct?” Fabe said.
In other words: even if the contested ballots were not counted in accordance with the guidelines advanced by Miller’s legal team – Miller still would have lost by over two thousand votes!
So seriously: What was the point of filing suit? Was Miller hoping to get some sort of deal from the Republican Party for conceding defeat? His lawsuit was as idiotic as his entire campaign had been. As late as December 27, Miller was vowing to continue his battle in the Federal Court to contest the election result. Nevertheless, as Miller should have learned at Yale Law School, the pursuit of such a specious claim in a Federal Court, would likely result in rather expensive sanctions against Miller and his attorneys under Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, once his case was inevitably dismissed. If that concern had not been enough to motivate Miller to abandon his Federal suit, it should have been enough to convince Miller’s attorneys that the game was finally over. Miller ultimately conceded his defeat in the election on December 30, although he never made a concession call to Lisa Murkowski. He explained that he had not made the call because he did not have Murkowski’s phone number.
Joe Miller may not have won the election to the United States Senate — but he did win the 2010 Jackass of The Year Award from TheCenterLane.com. Congratulations, Jackass!