Trump put Lisa Murkowski in his sights for next year and it looks like they aren’t wasting any time. Kelly Tshibaka has just announced she’ll be running against Murkowski next year in the Republican primary:
Lisa Murkowski has a GOP Primary challenger. Kelly Tshibaka, Alaska native, Harvard Law School grad, with a variety of Inspector General experience. https://t.co/CkC3W5KmLI
— Mollie (@MZHemingway) March 29, 2021
Here’s more from Politico:
Kelly Tshibaka, the state commissioner of administration, announced Monday that she would step down from her state job and challenge Murkowski, a vocal critic of Donald Trump whom the former president has vowed to oppose in next year’s midterm elections.
Tshibaka has tapped National Public Affairs, a consulting firm made up of Trump’s top 2020 campaign advisers, to help oversee her effort. Former Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien, deputy campaign manager Justin Clark and battleground states director Nick Trainer, who relaunched the firm after the presidential election, will serve as Tshibaka’s senior advisers.
The candidate has also signed on Tim Murtaugh, who was communications director on Trump’s reelection effort, to serve as a senior communications adviser. Mary Ann Pruitt, an Alaska-based political consultant who was a senior figure on Murkowski’s successful 2016 reelection campaign, has abandoned the senator and is working for Tshibaka.
The involvement underscores Trumpworld’s antipathy toward Murkowski, who was one of seven Republican senators to vote to convict the former president for his role in the Jan. 6 insurrection. Trump has said he will work to defeat Murkowski, telling POLITICO earlier this month: “I do not know where other people will be next year, but I know where I will be — in Alaska campaigning against a disloyal and very bad senator.”
They note that Trump didn’t recruit Tshibaka and hasn’t endorsed her yet, but it looks like he will:
Trump himself did not recruit Tshibaka, though people in his orbit have been on the hunt for a credible Murkowski opponent on the senator’s right flank, a person familiar with the matter said. The former president has yet to endorse a specific candidate in the race.
Other major Trump allies appear to be rallying around Tshibaka. Former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale tweeted that he “just donated to @KellyForAlaska. I think more conservatives should as well!” Corey Lewandowski, another former Trump campaign manager, tweeted out a news story about Tshibaka’s announcement.
Here’s a little more from Fox News:
Tshibaka was born and raised in Alaska, and was the first in her family to pursue a college degree, and went on to law school. Her father who was a union electrician and Vietnam War veteran, and her mother was one of the first workers at the startup of Prudhoe Bay. Her parents were homeless and living in a tent at one point but “fought their way into the middle class.”
Tshibaka, in her political career, has served as acting inspector general for the Federal Trade Commission, counsel to the Inspector General in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and in the Office of Inspector General within the Justice Department.
Tshibaka, prior to working in Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s administration, was the chief data officer for the Inspector General of the U.S. Postal Service Office under both former President Trump and former President Obama.
Tshibaka lives in Anchorage, Alaska with her husband and five children.
Murkowski is by far the worst Republican in the Senate, and that’s saying something considering Mitt Romney and Susan Collins are also in the Senate. I hope Tshibaka has what it takes to destroy her once and for all. This would be a huge accomplishment if she can do it.