Allard ‘Traini-Gate’ Messaging Mystery Deepens
New details have emerged in the ongoing saga involving Eagle River Assemblyperson Jamie Allard, who this past January used a message she says she received from former Anchorage Assembly Chair Dick Traini to smear the public testimony of Anchorage resident Andrew Gray.
When Gray testified this past January in support of AO 2021-117, he wasn't expecting his testimony to be attacked by a sitting Anchorage Assemblyperson, but that's precisely what happened when Jamie Allard, now a candidate for state office, called Gray back to the podium that night, presumably so she could entertain him with a question.
Allard told Gray that she had just received word from Traini, who she said wanted to chime in on his testimony.
"...he said that your testimony was full of crap — so when you're testifying on behalf of what Mr. Traini said, I would disagree that he said that," Allard told Gray.
Gray asserted as part of his public testimony that Traini was on record as stating that the Chambers belonged to the Assembly and control of the Chambers belonged to the Chair. Gray pointed out this fact in an attempt to persuade the Assembly to pass the ordinance after Anchorage Municipal Manager Amy Demboski had unsuccessfully ordered the Assembly's televised live stream to be cut at an October 7, 2021, Assembly meeting.
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In light of Allard's comments about his testimony, Gray said he immediately sent a text message to Traini telling him that he was sorry if he thought his testimony was "full of crap" and that he believed he had accurately quoted him.
"I am a big fan, and I don't want to cause offense," Gray wrote in his text message to Traini.
Gray tells me that Traini did not respond to his message and, as a result, felt obligated to file a public records request seeking Traini's message.
On February 3 — nearly a month after filing his records request, Gray received an email from Rebecca Metcalf, a Legal Assistant in the Assembly Counsel's Office, who informed Gray that a search for the elusive message Allard claims Traini sent her yielded no records responsive to his request.
Gray, concerned by the email that stated no such record of the message Allard said she received from Traini at the January assembly meeting existed, said that he picked up the phone and called the Assembly Counsel's Office to confirm his suspicion that Allard may not have been truthful about the message.
"They just kept repeating that no documents had met the criteria of my search request," Gray said.
Gray says that in light of the results of the records, which did not reveal the existence of the message Allard said she received, he emailed her and asked whether Traini did send the message as she asserted.
In response to his email, Gray said Allard left a long voicemail asking him to meet her at City Hall to discuss it. Gray said he couldn't, on a moment's notice, leave work in the middle of a work day to meet with Allard and that he hasn't heard from her since about the elusive and now mysterious message.
It's not clear why Allard, who last year fabricated her own social media deplatforming after having defended Nazi terminology seen on Alaska vanity license plates, won't share the message she says she received from Traini during the January 11, 2022, Assembly meeting.
