Sen. Lisa Murkowski continues to speak out

Senator Lisa Murkowski, (R-Alaska) attended the City of Nome’s Investment Summit on Friday, holding a keynote address and making time for an interview with The Nome Nugget.
Top of mind is the current administration’s policy to upend governmental agencies, firing federal employees, dismantling programs and terminating funds and grants with the stated aim to end fraud, abuse and government waste.
Murkowski said, while the Alaska Delegation tries to understand the status of the funding cuts and freezes, they mostly learn about them anecdotally. “It’s not like we get a list from the agencies saying: ‘We’ve frozen this, we’ve canceled this.’ We literally are finding out about it when people who have a grant application in process and they’re not able to get answers, and so they come to the delegation and we follow up.”
She said it is not unreasonable for a new administration to review certain programs and to put a brief pause on them. “It’s legit to review programs and funding, but there’s a difference, though, when you use that pause to basically go in a direction that takes funds that have been authorized in law and appropriated in law, and claw that back. That is when you cross the line, right?”
Asked about if there is push back from Congress and from the rest of the Alaska delegation, Murkowski said: “There’s multiple approaches to how we can deal with this. Some of which is very public, some of which is behind the scenes and I think the members of the Alaska delegation are doing all of the above. Perhaps I’m doing a little more in the public space, in calling some of these actions out as being unlawful.”
She described some the low-key measures taken, for example, when halibut fishermen didn’t get their permits, which need to be signed off by both the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Commerce, she texted Sec. Marco Rubio and explained to him that halibut are managed under an international treaty. That kind of outreach worked to get some results. Also, she had had to prevent cuts to the Low Income Housing Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP from “going away.” She said, the LIHEAP staff, for the most part, had been laid off and so her office weighed in, saying that this energy assistance “for people in Alaska and in other parts of the country where it’s still cold, it’s desperately needed.” She said the department gave assurance that the last increment of funding that was due at the end of this period is going to go out. “I think, quite honestly, had we not weighed in, those monies would not have been distributed because there wasn’t anybody home to administer them,” she said.
As rural Alaska braces for the impact of tariffs to effect the cost of living, Murkowski said that Congress does have a role to play. She said, over the years Congress has ceded some of the authority to levy tariffs to the executive but constituents are asking her now: “What are you doing about this? These tariffs are going to hurt us. The cost of living is already high, and now it’s going to be higher. The cost of that port out there is high, and it’s going to be even higher. What are you doing?”
According to Murkowski, a group of legislators have introduced a bill that follows the same type of a process as the War Powers Act. “There has to be notice to us, it has to be explained to us as to the economic impact,” she said. “And then Congress has a duty to act within a certain period of time. We cannot, kind of look the other way, when the executive is reaching into the legislative lane. We have got to remember that our obligation, the oath that we pledge to uphold, says we’re going to adhere to the Constitution. And the Constitution tells us this: You have the power of the purse.” The president already said he would veto such a bill, but Murkowski countered that Congress has the ability to override a President’s veto. “That gives us actually more power in the legislative branch than the executive has, but we can’t be afraid to use it. And that kind of goes to your broader question of, is there the will? Right now, there are seven Republicans that have signed on to this bipartisan bill and that kind of gets your attention.”
How afraid should we be?
 “We’ve gone through telling times before, and I think we’re seeing a level of disruption that is very unprecedented, and I think that that has, has put so many of us off guard,” she said. “I do feel like I am wearing the worry of a lot of Alaskans. And, well, I used the words and said, ‘We are all afraid.’ I’m not afraid in a way that you would say is cowardly. I feel the burden of the responsibility that comes with the anxiety of so many and my responsibility is then to be there, to either be a voice of reason, to elevate my voice, to go quietly and try to fix something, but to try to remind people that as anxious as these times are right now, and as fearful as many are, we are still the United States of America. We are still a system that is based on the rule of law, we are still a system that allows for checks and balances, and our obligation in the Congress is to make sure that we are continuing that check, whether it is the check to the executive, or the check to the to the judiciary. We remember that we are a nation of laws, and we will continue to respect the laws.”