A key point of interest in the emails will be the run up to Palin’s selection as vice president. | AP Photo Palin emails detail media defense

Sarah Palin’s government office was put on the defensive as national reporters swarmed the newly minted national figure who had been John McCain’s surprise pick for vice president, newly released emails show.

A flurry of email traffic between Palin, her advisers and even Newt Gingrich looked for ways to respond to the media inquiries that flooded the office in September 2008, running from the comprehensive to the unusual.


The dialogue about the media is one standout feature of the nearly 25,000 Palin official emails the state of Alaska released to news organizations Friday.

In a Sept. 15 email to Palin, her spokesman, Bill McAllister, relayed questions about who paid for the tanning bed in the governor’s house; “Is it your belief that dinosaurs and humans co-existed at one time?”; and “Do you have a favorite poem?”

McAllister seems to suggest that the answer to the second question might be “yes,” based on the Bible. “There is an interesting reference to ‘Behemoth’ in the Old Testament,” he writes.

Palin replied the same day with exasperation.

“I am so sorry that the office is swamped like this! Dinosaurs even?!” she wrote. “I’ll try to run through some of these in my head before responding. And the old, used tanning bed that my girls have used handful of times in Juneau? Yes, we paid for it ourselves. I, too, will continue to be dismayed at the media and am thankful you and Sharon [Leighow, the deputy communications director] are not part of the stange (sic) going’s-on in the media world of today.”

Palin’s office also sought to respond to more serious requests.

In response to a Washington Post reporter’s inquiry about her travel expenses, Michael Nizich, Palin’s chief of staff, offered talking points aimed at showing a favorable contrast between Palin and her predecessor as Alaska governor, Frank Murkowski.

Bullet points included “Governor Palin does not travel with an entourage” and “Governor Palin prefers to drive herself – no chauffeur,” as well as outlining ways they had saved the state money by reducing her security detail.

The office got some high-profile advice on that point as Newt Gingrich weighed in with an email copied to top McCain advisers Rick Davis and Steve Schmidt.

Leighow, he noted, had been quoted in the Post’s front-page story noting that “the palins could have charged the state per diem for each child under alaskan state law and did not do so.” The staff, Gingrich wrote, should add up the foregone costs to come up with a figure “that palin did NOT charge the taxpayers for that she was legally entitled to[.] Offsets 90 percent of the story’s impact.”

The team’s frustration and a bit of paranoia were evident in a Sept. 13 email from McAlister.

The New York Times, he reported to Palin, had called the day before. “It seemed like a trap; he bypassed the press office at first,” McAllister wrote. “Wasn’t sure what I could say, anyway. If I am going to respond to everything, I need more guidance.”

The 24,199 pages of emails from the first 21 months of Palin’s term in office were released to reporters at the Alaska statehouse at 9 a.m. Juneau time (1 p.m. Eastern) on Friday.

Seventeen news organizations — Alaskan, national and international — picked up sets of five 55-pound boxes of the printed-out emails, delivered on a hand truck. Each organization paid $726 in copying costs for the trove.

The state of Alaska fought the emails’ release but courts eventually ordered it based on a September 2008 Freedom of Information Act request by Mother Jones magazine, later joined by other media outlets.

The emails being released are from her start as governor in January 2007 through the time of the request. Correspondence from the rest of her time as governor has also been requested, but not yet released.

Palin’s camp tried to preempt any revelations in the emails with a statement Friday afternoon.

“The thousands upon thousands of emails released today show a very engaged Governor Sarah Palin being the CEO of her state,” Tim Crawford, treasurer of Sarah PAC, said in an email. “The emails detail a Governor hard at work. Everyone should read them.”