'Retread' Save Anchorage backed assembly candidate nabs over $30k in one week

Far-right candidate for Anchorage Assembly Liz Vazquez has raised $30,000 in her quest to become the new Jamie Allard of the Assembly, according to a post made by an administrator of the shadowy Save Anchorage political operation. Vazquez's campaign Facebook page actually states that the former Alaska legislator hauled in more than $30k in just one week, but as you know, Save Anchorage is often consistently inconsistent in its messaging.

The big fundraising announcement came after Vazquez held a December 22 fundraiser that listed Larry Baker, longtime Save Anchorage member and consultant for the Bronson Administration, as one of the event's hosts.

The group is now asking its deep-pocketed members to contribute more to retread candidate Vazquez, who is challenging Assembly Member Kameron Perez-Verdia in April's municipal election. Save Anchorage, a group whose members wasted thousands of dollars on two failed attempts to recall Progressive Assembly members, hopes to be competitive so that they can take Anchorage back from "overspending liberal zealots" by overspending on a candidate who will likely lose in April.

Messaging presented to the group by an administrator in the form of a social media post says they must have a friendly Conservative Assembly in place and that Vazquez is one of those people, but it's not clear if anyone from the group has even met Vasquez, who to other individuals may not be seen as friendly at all.

According to a now-deleted Facebook post made by Rep. Rasmussen in 2018, a quote said to have been given by one of Vazquez's constituents labeled her "unresponsive, arrogant, abrasive, and rude." While those particular qualities will likely help ensure she remains a member in good standing of Save Anchorage, they may not play well with voters in District 3, where Vazquez has to be competitive and, you know, get people to actually vote for her.

Save Anchorage members often storm social media to bemoan how mean and unreasonable Assembly Members are, but in the case of Vazquez, it might actually be true!

In the 2019 general election, Perez-Verdia trounced Vazquez by 10.7 points. In the 2021 mayoral election, District 3 went for Dunbar, and in the 2020 presidential election, District 3 went for Biden by roughly 12 points, according to Robert Hockema of the Alaska Politics & Elections Blog.

Add to that Vazquez's affiliation with the far-right Save Anchorage group, and you'll begin to see the uphill battle she faces to unseat Perez-Verdia. Vazquez's alignment with Save Anchorage may be good for filling the campaign coffers, but aside from that, it's not clear whether the group is as influential as it once was.

As we saw in the two failed efforts to recall Rivera and Zaletel, you can raise and waste vast amounts of money, post a never-ending stream of far-right narratives to Facebook pages and secret social media groups, get far-right media outlets to champion your cause and still see your efforts defeated at the hands of voters by 13 points as was the case in the Rivera Recall. Then, emboldened by your resounding loss and waste of taxpayer dollars, you can do even worse on your attempt to recall Meg Zaletel and lose by 19.8 points, leaving you to grouse on Facebook about how unfair the entire process was when in reality, voters are smarter than they're given credit for and can see through poorly reasoned initiatives and are able to self-identify extreme candidates for office.

Vazquez may have other potential problems with voters as well. Old social media posts made by the former Alaska legislator are likely to surface in the weeks and months ahead, and she may have to contend with a vocal group of former constituents who were, in a word, 'displeased' with the former Alaska legislator's representation of them.

I don't necessarily want to deep-dive the above social media post that asserts the flu vaccine contains 25,000 times more mercury than legally allowed in drinking water, but Vazquez's claim is false and misleads readers by conflating ethyl mercury, which is safe in small amounts, with methyl mercury, which is hazardous in even small amounts. The test, which claims to have found 25,000 times more mercury than drinking water in the vaccine, was done by an anti-vaccine crusader and not an independent accredited laboratory.

Vazquez's post does, however, leave one to ponder how she might feel about Anchorage's fluoridated water system. Something tells me she might not be a big fan of well-enameled teeth, but I could be wrong. Since Vazquez herself is a member of a group that often espouses vaccine conspiracy theories, the old saying may, in fact, be true — that birds of a feather do indeed flock together. Interestingly, Vazquez's campaign website makes no mention of COVID-19 or vaccines.

If you're looking to find out more about Vazquez and her campaign, look no further than this ad run on Facebook by her campaign which accuses the Assembly of abusing their power and states they need to be held accountable for their actions against the People.

Yep...capital P. Tells you all you need to know.