"The administration says, then, there are no downsides or upsides to treating terrorists like civilian criminal defendants, but a lot of us would beg to differ." -- Sarah Palin
Sarah Louise Palin (; née Heath; born February 11, 1964) is an American politician, author, speaker, and political news commentator who was the youngest person and the first woman elected Governor of Alaska. She served as governor from 2006 until she resigned in 2009. Chosen by Republican Party presidential candidate John McCain in August 2008 to be his running mate in that year's presidential election, she was the first Alaskan on the national ticket of a major party, as well as the first female vice-presidential nominee of the Republican Party.
On July 3, 2009, Palin announced she would not seek reelection as governor and that she was resigning effective July 26, 2009, eighteen months before the completion of her term. She cited ethics complaints that had been filed following her selection as running mate to John McCain as one of the reasons for her resignation, saying the resulting investigations had affected her ability to govern the state. Speculation that she will run for the Republican Party presidential nomination in 2012 began prior to the defeat of the McCain—Palin ticket in 2008. In September 2010 a Daily Beast reporter said a presidential campaign "seems inevitable" and White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs described Palin as "the most formidable force in the Republican Party."
Before she was elected governor, she was a member of the Wasilla, Alaska City Council from 1992 to 1996, and the city's mayor from 1996 to 2002. After an unsuccessful campaign for lieutenant governor of Alaska in 2002, she chaired the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission from 2003 until she resigned in 2004.
In November 2009, her autobiography An American Life was released and it quickly became a best-seller, selling more than two million copies. In January 2010, Palin began providing political commentary to the Fox News Channel under a multi-year contract. It was announced in March 2010 that she was to host her own TV show, called Sarah Palin's Alaska. Palin is authoring a second book, America by Heart, which is expected to be on shelves by November 23, 2010.
"A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I'm not one though who would attribute it to being man-made.""America is looking for answers. She's looking for a new direction; the world is looking for a light. That light can come from America's great North Star; it can come from Alaska.""America's finest - our men and women in uniform, are a force for good throughout the world, and that is nothing to apologize for.""Americans expect us to go to Washington for the right reason, and not just to mingle with the right people.""Assange is not a 'journalist' any more than the 'editor' of al-Qaeda's new English-language magazine 'Inspire' is a 'journalist.' He is an anti-American operative with blood on his hands.""Buck up or stay in the truck.""Common sense tells us that the government's attempts to solve large problems more often create new ones. Common sense also tells us that a top-down, one-size-fits-all plan will not improve the workings of a nationwide health-care system that accounts for one-sixth of our economy.""Despite what the pundits want us to think, contested primaries aren't civil war, they are democracy at work, and that's beautiful.""Each of us knows that we have an obligation to care for the old, the young and the sick. We stand strongest when we stand with the weakest among us.""For a season, a gifted speaker can inspire with his words, but for a lifetime John McCain has inspired with his deeds.""Here's a little newsflash for those reporters and commentators: I'm not going to Washington to seek their good opinion. I'm going to Washington to serve this great country.""I am a conservative Republican, a firm believer in free market capitalism. A free market system allows all parties to compete, which ensures the best and most competitive project emerges, and ensures a fair, democratic process.""I came to office promising major ethics reform to end the culture of self-dealing. And today, that ethics reform is a law. While I was at it, I got rid of a few things in the governor's office that I didn't believe our citizens should have to pay for. That luxury jet was over-the-top. I put it on eBay.""I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities.""I love those hockey moms. You know what they say the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull is? Lipstick.""I think President Obama is trying to deceive the public in pretending that he was not a part of Congress that has made some decisions in the past that got us to where we are today.""I'm just one of many moms who will say an extra prayer each night for our sons and daughters going into harm's way.""I'm pro-life. I'll do all I can to see every baby is created with a future and potential. The legislature should do all it can to protect human life.""In politics there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers, and then there are those like John McCain who use their careers to promote change.""My fellow citizens, the American Presidency is not supposed to be a journey of personal discovery.""New terms used like, 'overseas contingency operation' instead of the word 'war' - that reflects a worldview that is out of touch with the enemy that we face. We can't spin our way out of this threat.""Our government needs to adopt a pro-market agenda that doesn't pick winners and losers, but it invites competition and it levels the playing field for everyone.""People have a constitutional right to burn a Koran if they want to, but doing so is insensitive and an unnecessary provocation - much like building a mosque at Ground Zero.""People know something has gone terribly wrong with our government and it has gotten so far off track. But people also know that there is nothing wrong in America that a good old-fashioned election can't fix.""Politics isn't just a game of clashing parties and competing interests. The right reason is to challenge the status quo, to serve the common good, and to leave this nation better than we found it.""Sometimes even the greatest joys bring challenge, and children with special needs inspire a very, very special love.""The fact that drilling won't solve every problem is no excuse to do nothing at all.""The lesson of the last year is this: foreign policy can't be managed through the politics of personality, and our President would do well to take note of an observation John F. Kennedy made once he was in office - that all of the world's problems aren't his predecessor's fault.""The only place that the left hasn't placed the blame is on their agenda, so some advice for our friends on that side of the aisle: that's where you've gotta look because that's what got you into this mess.""The Republican Party would be really smart to absorb as much of the Tea Party movement as possible.""They think that, if we were just smart enough, we'd be able to understand their policies. And I so want to tell 'em, and I do tell 'em, Oh, we're plenty smart, oh yeah - we know what's goin' on. And we don't like what's goin' on. And we're not gonna let them tell us to sit down and shut up.""To reduce deficit spending and our enormous debt, you reign in spending. You cut the budget. You don't take more from the private sector and grow government with it. And that's exactly what Obama has in mind with this expiration of Bush tax cuts proposal of his.""To the families of special needs children all across this country I have a message for you: for years you have sought to make America a more welcoming place for your sons and daughters, and I pledge to you that if we're elected, you will have a friend, an advocate, in The White House.""To win this war, we need a commander in chief, not a professor of law standing at the lectern.""Washington has got to, across the board, lower taxes for small businesses so that our mom and pops can reinvest and hire people, so that our businesses can thrive.""We don't need to fundamentally transform America. We need to restore America.""We eat, therefore we hunt.""We need a foreign policy that distinguishes America's friends from her enemies, and recognizes the true threats that we face.""We need American sources of resources, we need American energy, brought to you by American ingenuity and produced by American workers.""We need independents, we need the GOP, we need Reagan Democrats.""We need leaders who will stand up for the little guy and listen once again.""We tend to prefer candidates that don't talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.""Well, I'm not a member of the permanent political establishment, and I've learned quickly these last few days that if you're not a member in good standing of the Washington elite, then some in the media consider a candidate unqualified for that reason alone.""When oil and gas prices went up dramatically and filled up the state treasury, I sent a large share of that revenue back where it belonged - directly to the people of Alaska.""When we talk about fighting for our country, we're talking about our vote, our vote is our arms.""When we talk about fighting for our country, we're talking about our vote, our vote is our arms."
Palin was born in Sandpoint, Idaho, the third of four children (three daughters, one son) to Sarah "Sally" (née Sheeran), a school secretary, and Charles "Chuck" Heath, a science teacher and track coach. She is of English, Irish and German descent. Her siblings are Chuck, Jr., Heather (Bruce), and Molly (McCann). While Palin was an infant, the family moved to Alaska, where her father found more opportunities for his teaching job. The family first lived in Eagle River, but relocated to Wasilla in 1972, when she was 8 years old. Palin played flute in the junior high band, then attended Wasilla High School where she was the head of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, and a member of the girls' basketball and cross country running teams. During her senior year, she was co-captain and point guard of the basketball team that won the Alaska state championship, earning the nickname "Sarah Barracuda" for her competitive streak.
In 1984, Palin won the Miss Wasilla pageant. She finished third in the Miss Alaska pageant, playing flute in the talent portion of the contest, and receiving both the Miss Congeniality award and a college scholarship.
Palin attended Hawaii Pacific University in the fall of 1982 and North Idaho College in the spring and fall of 1983. (In June 2008, the Alumni Association of North Idaho College gave her its Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award). She attended the University of Idaho in the fall of 1984 and spring of 1985, and attended Matanuska-Susitna College in the fall of 1985. Palin returned to the University of Idaho in the spring of 1986, receiving her bachelor's degree in communications with an emphasis in journalism from there in 1987.
After graduating, she worked as a sportscaster for KTUU-TV and KTVA-TV in Anchorage, and as a sports reporter for the Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman, fulfilling an early ambition.
On August 29, 1988, she eloped with her high school sweetheart Todd Palin; according to her later account, this was to spare her parents the expense of a "big white wedding". After the marriage, she helped in her husband's commercial fishing business.
Throughout her tenure on the city council and the rest of her political career, Palin has remained a Republican, first registering as such in 1982.
Wasilla city council
Palin was elected to the Wasilla City Council in 1992 winning 530 votes to 310. She ran for reelection in 1995, winning by 413 votes to 185.
Mayor of Wasilla
Motivated by concerns that revenue from a new Wasilla sales tax would not be spent wisely, Palin ran for mayor of Wasilla in 1996, defeating incumbent mayor John Stein 651 to 440 votes. Her biographer has described her campaign as targeting wasteful spending and high taxes; her opponent Stein has said that Palin introduced abortion, gun rights, and term limits as campaign issues. The election was nonpartisan, but the state Republican Party took the unprecedented step of running advertisements for Palin. Palin ran for re-election against Stein in 1999 and won, 909 votes to 292. In 2002, she completed the second of the two consecutive three-year terms she was allowed to serve by the city charter. She was elected president of the Alaska Conference of Mayors in 1999.
First term
During her first year in office, Palin kept a jar with the names of Wasilla residents on her desk. Once a week, she pulled out a name, picked up the phone and asked: "How's the city doing?" Using income generated by a 2% sales tax that had been approved by Wasilla voters in October 1992, Palin cut property taxes by 75% and eliminated personal property and business inventory taxes. Using municipal bonds, she made improvements to the roads and sewers, and increased funding to the Police Department. She also oversaw new bike paths and procured funding for storm-water treatment to protect freshwater resources. At the same time, she shrank the local museum's budget and deterred talk of a new library and city hall.
Shortly after taking office in October 1996, Palin eliminated the position of museum director and asked for updated resumes and resignation letters from "city department heads who had been loyal to Stein," including the police chief, public works director, finance director, and librarian. Palin stated this request was to find out their intentions and whether they supported her. She temporarily required department heads to get her approval before talking to reporters, saying that they first needed to become acquainted with her administration's policies. She created the position of city administrator, and reduced her own $68,000 salary by 10%, although by mid-1998 this was reversed by the city council.
In October 1996, Palin asked the library director, Mary Ellen Emmons, if she would object to the removal of a book from the library if people were picketing to have the book removed. Emmons responded that she would not be the only one objecting: "And I told her it would not be just me. This was a constitutional question, and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) would get involved, too." In early December, Palin made a written statement about the book removal request, saying she had been trying to get to know her staff and had been discussing many issues with them "both rhetorical and realistic in nature." No books were removed and no attempt was made to remove books from the library during Palin's tenure as mayor.
Palin said she fired Police Chief Irl Stambaugh because he did not fully support her efforts to govern the city. Stambaugh filed a lawsuit alleging wrongful termination and violation of his free speech rights. The judge dismissed Stambaugh's lawsuit, holding that that the police chief served at the discretion of the mayor, and could be terminated for nearly any reason, even a political one, and ordered Stambaugh to pay Palin's legal fees.
Second term
During her second term as mayor, Palin proposed and promoted the construction of a municipal sports center to be financed by a 0.5% sales tax increase and $14.7 million bond issue. Voters approved the measure by a 20 vote margin and the Wasilla Multi-Use Sports Complex was built on time and under budget. However, the city spent an additional $1.3 million because of an eminent domain lawsuit caused by the failure to obtain clear title to the property before beginning construction. The city's long-term debt grew from about $1 million to $25 million due to $15 million for the sports complex, $5.5 million for street projects, and $3 million for water improvement projects. The Wall Street Journal characterized the project as a "financial mess". A city council member defended the spending increases as being caused by the city's growth during that time.
Palin also joined with nearby communities in hiring the Anchorage-based lobbying firm of Robertson, Monagle & Eastaugh to lobby for federal funds. The firm secured nearly $8 million in earmarks for the Wasilla city government, including $500,000 for a youth shelter, $1.9 million for a transportation hub, and $900,000 for sewer repairs.
In 2008, Wasilla's current mayor credited Palin's 75 percent property tax cuts and infrastructure improvements with bringing "big-box stores" and 50,000 shoppers per day to Wasilla. A local gun store owner said Palin made the town "more of a community ... It's no longer a little strip town that you can blow through in a heartbeat." At the conclusion of Palin's tenure as mayor in 2002, the city had about 6,300 residents.
State level politics
In 2002, Palin ran for the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor, coming in second to Loren Leman in a five-way Republican primary. Following her defeat, she campaigned throughout the state for the Republican governor-lieutenant governor ticket of Frank Murkowski and Loren Leman. Murkowski and Leman won, Murkowski resigned from his long-held U.S. Senate seat in December 2002 to assume the governorship. Palin was said to be on the "short list" of possible appointees to Murkowski's U.S. Senate seat, but Murkowski ultimately appointed his daughter, State Representative Lisa Murkowski, as his successor in the Senate.
Governor Murkowski offered a number of other jobs to Palin, and in February 2003, she accepted an appointment to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, which oversees Alaska's oil and gas fields for safety and efficiency. Although she had little background in the area, she said she wanted to learn more about the oil industry, and was named chair of the commission and ethics supervisor. By November 2003 she was filing non-public ethics complaints with the state attorney general and the governor against a fellow commission member, Randy Ruedrich, a former petroleum engineer and the current chair of the state Republican Party. Palin had observed Ruedrich doing Party business on the state's time, and leaking confidential information to oil industry insiders. He was forced to resign in November 2003. Palin resigned in January 2004 and put her protests against Ruedrich's "lack of ethics" into the public arena by filing a public complaint against Ruedrich, who was then fined $12,000. She also joined with Democratic legislator Eric Croft in complaining that Gregg Renkes, a former Alaskan Attorney General, had a financial conflict of interest in negotiating a coal exporting trade agreement. Renkes also resigned his post.
From 2003 to June 2005, Palin served as one of three directors of "Ted Stevens Excellence in Public Service, Inc.," a 527 group designed to provide political training for Republican women in Alaska. In 2004, Palin told the Anchorage Daily News that she had decided not to run for the U.S. Senate that year against the Republican incumbent Lisa Murkowski because her teenage son opposed it. Palin said, "How could I be the team mom if I was a U.S. Senator?"
In 2006, running on a clean-government platform, Palin defeated incumbent Governor Frank Murkowski in the Republican gubernatorial primary. Her running mate was State Senator Sean Parnell.
In the November election, Palin was outspent but victorious, defeating former Democratic governor Tony Knowles by a margin of 48.3% to 40.9%. She became Alaska's first female governor, at the age of 42, the youngest governor in Alaskan history, the state's first governor to have been born after Alaska achieved U.S. statehood, and the first not to be inaugurated in Juneau (she chose to have the ceremony held in Fairbanks instead). She took office on December 4, 2006, and for most of her term was very popular with Alaska voters. Polls taken in 2007 showed her with 93% and 89% popularity among all voters, which led some media outlets to call her "the most popular governor in America." A poll taken in late September 2008 after Palin was named to the national Republican ticket showed her popularity in Alaska at 68%. A poll taken in May 2009 showed Palin's popularity among Alaskans was at 54% positive and 41.6% negative.
Palin declared that top priorities of her administration would be resource development, education and workforce development, public health and safety, and transportation and infrastructure development. She had championed ethics reform throughout her election campaign. Her first legislative action after taking office was to push for a bipartisan ethics reform bill. She signed the resulting legislation in July 2007, calling it a "first step", and declaring that she remained determined to clean up Alaska politics.
Palin frequently broke with the state Republican establishment. For example, she endorsed Sean Parnell's bid to unseat the state's longtime at-large U.S. Representative, Don Young, and she publicly challenged then-Senator Ted Stevens to come clean about the federal investigation into his financial dealings. Shortly before his July 2008 indictment, she held a joint news conference with Stevens, described by The Washington Post as intended to "make clear she had not abandoned him politically."
Palin promoted oil and natural gas resource development in Alaska, including drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). Proposals to drill for oil in ANWR have been the subject of a national debate.
In 2006, Palin obtained a passport and in 2007 traveled for the first time outside of North America on a trip to Kuwait. There she visited the Khabari Alawazem Crossing at the Kuwait—Iraq border and met with members of the Alaska National Guard at several bases. On her return trip, she visited injured soldiers in Germany.
Budget, spending, and federal funds
In June 2007, Palin signed a record $6.6 billion operating budget into law. At the same time, she used her veto power to make the second-largest cuts of the construction budget in state history. The $237 million in cuts represented over 300 local projects, and reduced the construction budget to $1.6 billion.
In 2008, Palin vetoed $286 million, cutting or reducing funding for 350 projects from the FY09 capital budget.
Palin followed through on a campaign promise to sell the Westwind II jet, a purchase made by the Murkowski administration for $2.7 million in 2005 against the wishes of the legislature. In August 2007, the jet was listed on eBay, but the sale fell through, and the plane was later sold for $2.1 million through a private brokerage firm.
Gubernatorial expenditures
Palin lived in Juneau during the legislative session and lived in Wasilla and worked out of offices in Anchorage the rest of the year. Since the office in Anchorage is 565 miles from Juneau, while she worked there, state officials said she was permitted to claim a $58 per diem travel allowance, which she took (a total of $16,951), and to reimbursement for hotels, which she did not, choosing instead to drive about 50 miles to her home in Wasilla. She also chose not to use the former governor's private chef. Republicans and Democrats have criticized Palin for taking the per diem and $43,490 in travel expenses for the times her family accompanied her on state business. In response, Palin's staffers said that these practices were in line with state policy, that her gubernatorial expenses are 80% below those of her predecessor, Frank Murkowski, and that "many of the hundreds of invitations Palin receives include requests for her to bring her family, placing the definition of 'state business' with the party extending the invitation." In February 2009, the State of Alaska, reversing a policy that had treated the payments as legitimate business expenses under the Internal Revenue Code, decided that per diems paid to state employees for stays in their own homes will be treated as taxable income and will be included in employees' gross income on their W-2 forms. Palin herself had ordered the review of the tax policy.
In December 2008, an Alaska state commission recommended increasing the Governor's annual salary from $125,000 to $150,000. Palin stated that she would not accept the pay raise. In response, the commission dropped the recommendation.
Federal funding
In her State of the State address on January 17, 2008, Palin declared that the people of Alaska "can and must continue to develop our economy, because we cannot and must not rely so heavily on federal government [funding]." Alaska's federal congressional representatives cut back on pork-barrel project requests during Palin's time as governor; despite this, in 2008 Alaska was still the largest per-capita recipient of federal earmarks, requesting nearly $750 million in special federal spending over a period of two years.
While there is no sales tax or income tax in Alaska, state revenues doubled to $10 billion in 2008. For the 2009 budget, Palin gave a list of 31 proposed federal earmarks or requests for funding, totaling $197 million, to Alaska Senator Ted Stevens. Palin’s decreasing support for federal funding was a source of friction between her and the state's congressional delegation; Palin requested less in federal funding each year than her predecessor Frank Murkowski requested in his last year.
Bridge to Nowhere
In 2005, before Palin was elected governor, Congress passed a $442-million earmark for constructing two Alaska bridges as part of an omnibus spending bill. The Gravina Island Bridge received nationwide attention as a symbol of pork-barrel spending, following news reports that the bridge would cost $233 million in Federal funds. Because Gravina Island, the site of the Ketchikan airport, has a population of 50, the bridge became known nationally as the "Bridge to Nowhere". Following an outcry by the public and some members of the US Senate, Congress eliminated the bridge earmark from the spending bill but gave the allotted funds to Alaska as part of its general transportation fund.
In 2006, Palin ran for governor with a "build-the-bridge" plank in her platform, saying she would "not allow the spinmeisters to turn this project ... into something that's so negative." Palin criticized the use of the word "nowhere" as insulting to local residents and urged speedy work on building the infrastructure "while our congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist."
As governor, Palin canceled the Gravina Island Bridge in September 2007, saying that Congress had "little interest in spending any more money" due to what she called "inaccurate portrayals of the projects." Alaska chose not to return the $442 million in federal transportation funds.
In 2008, as a vice-presidential candidate, Palin characterized her position as having told Congress "thanks, but no thanks, on that bridge to nowhere." This angered some Alaskans in Ketchikan, who said that the claim was false and a betrayal of Palin's previous support for their community. Some critics complained that this statement was misleading, since she had expressed support for the spending project and kept the Federal money after the project was canceled. Palin was also criticized for allowing construction of a 3-mile access road, built with $25 million in Federal transportation funds set aside as part of the original bridge project, to continue. A spokesman for Alaska's Department of Transportation made a statement that it was within Palin's power to cancel the road project, but also noted that the state was still considering cheaper designs to complete the bridge project, and that in any case, the road would open up the surrounding lands for development.
Gas pipeline
In August 2008, Palin signed a bill authorizing the State of Alaska to award TransCanada Pipelines ... the sole bidder to meet the state's requirements ... a license to build and operate a pipeline to transport natural gas from the North Slope to the Continental United States through Canada. The governor also pledged $500 million in seed money to support the project. It is estimated that the project will cost $26 billion. Newsweek described the project as "the principal achievement of Sarah Palin's term as Alaska's governor." The pipeline faces legal challenges from Canadian First Nations.
Predator control
In 2007, Palin supported a 2003 Alaska Department of Fish and Game policy allowing the hunting of wolves from the air as part of a predator control program intended to increase moose and caribou populations for subsistence-food gatherers and other hunters. In March 2007, Palin's office announced that a bounty of $150 per wolf would be paid to the 180 volunteer pilots and gunners, to offset fuel costs, in five areas of Alaska. Six-hundred-and-seven wolves had been killed in the prior four years. State biologists wanted 382 to 664 wolves killed by the end of the predator-control season in April 2007. Wildlife activists sued the state, and a state judge declared the bounty illegal on the basis that a bounty would have to be offered by the Board of Game and not by the Department of Fish and Game.
Public Safety Commissioner dismissal
Palin dismissed Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan on July 11, 2008, citing performance-related issues, such as not being "a team player on budgeting issues" and "egregious rogue behavior." Palin attorney Thomas Van Flein said that the "last straw" was Monegan's planned trip to Washington, D.C., to seek funding for a new, multimillion-dollar sexual assault initiative the governor hadn't yet approved. Monegan said that he had resisted persistent pressure from Palin, her husband, and her staff, including State Attorney General Talis Colberg, to fire Palin’s ex-brother-in-law, Alaska State Trooper Mike Wooten; Wooten was involved in a child custody battle with Palin’s sister after a bitter divorce that included an alleged death threat against Palin's father. At one point Sarah and Todd Palin hired a private investigator to get Wooten disciplined. Monegan stated that he learned an internal investigation had found all but two of the allegations to be unsubstantiated, and Wooten had been disciplined for the others ... an illegal moose killing and the tasering of his 11-year-old stepson (the child 'reportedly' asked to be tasered). He told the Palins that there was nothing he could do because the matter was closed. When contacted by the press for comment, Monegan first acknowledged pressure to fire Wooten but said that he could not be certain that his own firing was connected to that issue; he later asserted that the dispute over Wooten was a major reason for his firing. Palin stated on July 17 that Monegan was not pressured to fire Wooten, nor dismissed for not doing so.
Monegan said the subject of Wooten came up when he invited Palin to a birthday party for his cousin, state senator Lyman Hoffman, in February 2007 during the legislative session in Juneau. "As we were walking down the stairs in the capitol building she wanted to talk to me about her former brother-in-law," Monegan said. "I said, 'Ma'am, I need to keep you at arm's length with this. I can't deal about him with you. She said, 'OK, that's a good idea.'"
Palin said there was "absolutely no pressure ever put on Commissioner Monegan to hire or fire anybody, at any time. I did not abuse my office powers. And I don't know how to be more blunt and candid and honest, but to tell you that truth. To tell you that no pressure was ever put on anybody to fire anybody." "Never putting any pressure on him," added Todd Palin.
On August 13 she acknowledged that a half dozen members of her administration had made more than two dozen calls on the matter to various state officials. "I do now have to tell Alaskans that such pressure could have been perceived to exist, although I have only now become aware of it," she said. Palin said, "Many of these inquiries were completely appropriate. However, the serial nature of the contacts could be perceived as some kind of pressure, presumably at my direction."
Chuck Kopp, who Palin had appointed to replace Monegan as public safety commissioner, received a $10,000 state severance package after he resigned following just two weeks on the job. Kopp, the former Kenai chief of police, resigned July 25 following disclosure of a 2005 sexual harassment complaint and letter of reprimand against him. Monegan said that he didn't get any severance package from the state.
Legislative investigation
On August 1, 2008 the Alaska Legislature hired an investigator, Stephen Branchflower, to review the Monegan dismissal. Legislators stated that Palin had the legal authority to fire Monegan, but they wanted to know whether her action had been motivated by anger at Monegan for not firing Wooten. The atmosphere was bipartisan and Palin pledged to cooperate. Wooten remained employed as a state trooper. She placed an aide on paid leave due to a tape-recorded phone conversation that she deemed improper, in which the aide, appearing to act on her behalf, complained to a trooper that Wooten had not been fired.
Several weeks after the start of what the media referred to as "troopergate", Palin was chosen as John McCain's running mate.
Palin describes herself as a hockey mom. The Palins have five children: sons Track (b. 1989) and Trig Paxson Van (b. 2008), and daughters Bristol Sheeran Marie (b. 1990), Willow (b. 1994), and Piper (b. 2001) Track enlisted in the U.S. Army on September 11, 2007, and was subsequently assigned to an infantry brigade. He and his unit deployed to Iraq in September 2008 for 12 months. Palin's youngest child, Trig, was prenatally diagnosed with Down syndrome. Palin has one grandchild, a boy named Tripp Easton Mitchell Johnston, who was born to her eldest daughter Bristol, in 2008. Her husband Todd works for the British oil company BP as an oil-field production operator and owns a commercial fishing business.
Palin was born into a Roman Catholic family. Later, her family joined the Wasilla Assembly of God, a Pentecostal church, which she attended until 2002. Palin then switched to the Wasilla Bible Church because, she said, she preferred the children's ministries offered there. When in Juneau, she attends the Juneau Christian Center. Palin described herself in an interview as a "Bible-believing Christian." After the Republican National Convention, a spokesperson for the McCain campaign told CNN that Palin "doesn't consider herself Pentecostal" and has "deep religious convictions."
Palin has been a registered Republican since 1982.
Palin opposed the 2010 health care reform package, saying it would lead to rationing of health care by a bureaucracy, which she described using the analogy "death panels". This legislation is the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, as modified by the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010. Palin supports repeal of portions of the act.
Palin said Obama would be reelected if "he played the war card. Say he decided to declare war on Iran or decided really come out and do whatever he could to support Israel, which I would like him to do."
Palin opposes same-sex marriage, abortion including in cases of rape and incest, and embryonic stem cell research. She supports capital punishment, and parental consent for female minors seeking an abortion, and supports creationism being taught as an option in public schools.
Palin supports sex education in public schools that encourage abstinence along with contraception.
A Life Member of the National Rifle Association (NRA), Palin interprets the Second Amendment as including the right to handgun possession, and opposes bans on semi-automatic assault weapons. and supports gun safety education for youth.
Palin supports off-shore drilling, and land-based drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. When commenting on the Gulf Coast oil disaster Palin said, "I repeat the slogan 'drill here, drill now.'" She said, "I want our country to be able to trust the oil industry."
Palin has expressed skepticism about the causes of global warming, but agrees that "man's activities certainly can be contributing to the issue" and that action should be taken. She is opposed to cap-and-trade proposals, such as the American Clean Energy and Security Act, a bill still pending in the Senate. Palin has acknowledged that "Simply waiting for low-carbon-emitting renewable capacity to be large enough will mean that it will be too late to meet the mitigation goals..that will be required [for carbon dioxide] under most credible climate-change models."
On foreign policy, Palin supported the Bush Administration's policies in Iraq, but is concerned that "dependence on foreign energy" may be obstructing efforts to "have an exit plan in place". Palin supports preemptive military action in the face of an imminent threat, and supports U.S. military operations in Pakistan. Palin supports NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia, and affirms that if Russia invaded a NATO member, the United States should meet its treaty obligations.
Prior to the Republican National Convention, a Gallup poll found that most voters were unfamiliar with Sarah Palin. During her campaign to become vice president, 39% said Palin was ready to serve as president if needed, 33% said Palin was not, and 29% had no opinion. This was "the lowest vote of confidence in a running mate since the elder George Bush chose then-Indiana senator Dan Quayle to join his ticket in 1988." Following the Convention, her image came under close media scrutiny, particularly with regard to her religious perspective on public life, her socially conservative views, and her perceived lack of experience. Palin's experience in foreign and domestic politics came under criticism among conservatives as well as liberals following her nomination. At the same time, Palin became more popular than John McCain among Republicans.
One month after McCain announced Palin as his running mate, she was viewed both more favorably and unfavorably among voters than her opponent, Delaware Senator Joe Biden. A plurality of the television audience rated Biden's performance higher at the 2008 vice-presidential debate. Media outlets repeated Palin's statement that she "stood up to Big Oil" when she resigned after 11 months as the head of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, due to abuses she witnessed involving other Republican commissioners and their ties to energy companies and energy lobbyists, and again when she raised taxes on oil companies as governor. In turn, others have said that Palin is a "friend of Big Oil" due to her advocacy of oil exploration and development including drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the de-listing of the polar bear as an endangered species. The National Organization for Women did not endorse McCain/Palin.
Palin was selected as one of America’s "Top 10 Most Fascinating People" of 2008 for a Barbara Walters ABC special on December 4, 2008. In April 2010, Sarah Palin was selected as one of the 100 World's Most Influential People by TIME Magazine.