We thought she was dead and buried, but now the incredible Sarah Palin is back in service at 58. She has announced that she is running for Alaska’s seat in Congress from Washington, nearly thirteen years after stepping away from politics. The former state governor remains very well known in conservative circles and should be able to easily fund her campaign.
Above all, she has obtained the support of Donald Trump, whom she has faithfully defended for years. She is “strong and clever and does not back down from anything”, claimed the latter. Which is not surprising because Sarah Palin is a bit of the precursor, in the feminine, of Trump, but less vulgar. “There would have been no Trump without Palin,” wrote journalist Peter Hamby on Twitter.
Like the former president, this mother of five children, including a boy with Down’s syndrome, presented herself as an outsider who does not take gloves to the post of governor of Alaska in 2006. During the 2008 presidential election, becoming running mate of Republican candidate John McCain, she attacked the media and crooked politicians in Washington, while advocating moral values and denouncing the practice of abortion. Themes that Trump has taken up on his own.
Republican candidate Donald Trump greets Sarah Palin, former Tea Party leader and former Governor of Alaska, January 19, 2016 in Ames, Iowa
afp.com/Aaron P. Bernstein
Like him, “Mama Grizzly”, who hunts caribou, quickly became the face of the Conservatives. She had the gift of electrifying the crowds in the electoral rallies with often rambling speeches, enamelled with “palinisms”, populist slogans and fanciful declarations. Like him, finally, she distinguished herself by her pearls and her ignorance. To praise her experience in foreign policy, she explained for example that we “could see Russia from Alaska”. A little phrase that made the joy of comedians.
After her defeat in the presidential election and her resignation in the wake of her post as governor, she received 1.2 million dollars to write Memoirs which sold 2 million copies. She also signed a contract to commentate on Fox News and used her stardom to launch a cathodic career. Without much success.
She tried her hand at a reality show, Sarah Palin’s Alaska, with Mark Burnett, the producer of The Apprentice, the Trump show. More recently, she took part in a dance competition dressed as a pink and blue bear and caused a scandal by dining at a restaurant in New York when she tested positive for Covid. At 58, Sarah Palin is therefore emerging from hibernation and preparing for her return, helped by former members of the Trump team.
“Watching the far left destroy the country, I knew I had to step up and join the fight,” she said on Facebook. But she has competition. There are more than fifty candidates in the primaries. And she is no longer the idol of the Republicans in a party where her clones are legion. As for his popularity in Alaska, it plummeted. According to an October poll, only 31% of voters had a favorable opinion of the former governor.