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Palin: Monegan was pressured to fire Wooten

by Jason Moore
Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2008

ANCHORAGE, Alaska-- Wednesday brought a dramatic turn of events regarding an inquiry into Gov. Sarah Palin's termination of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan.

The governor hastily called a press conference to announce that her administration did in fact make calls regarding Alaska State Trooper Mike Wooten.

Palin said her administration made more than 20 calls to the Department of Public Safety regarding Wooten, the governor's former brother-in-law.

Palin previously had denied her administration pressured Monegan but at least one of those calls was caught on tape.

Recently Palin told Channel 2 News that Monegan was not terminated over his refusal to terminate Wooten.

She continues to stand by that statement. But now she says evidence uncovered by an inquiry by a state attorney general inquiry suggests the administration applied pressure on Monegan to fire Wooten.

"The individual inquiries taken by themselves are one thing. Many of these inquiries were completely appropriate; however, the serial nature of the contacts understandably could be perceived as some kind of pressure, presumably at my direction," Palin said.

Attorney General Talis Colberg's office determined there were more than two dozen calls from Palin's husband, Todd Palin, and her staff to Monegan and other supervisors in the department regarding Wooten.

Palin says she was aware of many of the contacts and says many were completely appropriate.

But one of the calls beween her aide, Frank Bailey, and Trooper Lt. Rodney Dial was preserved on tape.

The governor released the tape to the media Wednesday and called it "out of bounds."

In the call Bailey told Dial the Palins were frustrated Wooten had kept his job.

"Everything that has come back to Todd and the governor, there's nothing we can do and that's very frustrating," Bailey said.

Bailey goes on to say the governor is unhappy Monegan won't take action.

"The CD of this conversation is obviously problematic because Mr. Bailey seemed to be speaking on my behalf -- and because he complained in this conversation that Trooper Wooten had not been terminated," said the governor. "But Mr. Bailey was not speaking for me. His comments were unauthorized as well as just wrong."

Late Wednesday, Bailey affirmed the Gov. Palin's statement that neither she nor her husband asked him to make the call.

"I know we keep using the word 'pressure' but nobody pressured me to say anything," Bailey said.

Colberg also reports it wasn't just Bailey contacting Monegan and others at DPS regarding Trooper Wooten.

The attorney general revealed that he, along with Todd Palin and former Palin Chief of Staff Mike Tibbles had all made contact regarding Wooten.

The administration says all of the information will be turned over to the special investigator hired by the Legislature to look into abuse-of-power allegations.

This was scheduled to happen Wednesday afternoon.

Contact Jason Moore at jmoore@ktuu.com