ANCHORAGE, Alaska — An FBI spokesman took the unusual step Sunday of declaring that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is not under investigation, an announcement prompted by rumors to the contrary on many websites.
“We are not investigating her,” said FBI spokesman Eric Gonzalez. “Normally, we don’t confirm or deny those kinds of allegations out there, but by not doing so, it just casts her in a very bad light.”
His statement follows a Saturday letter from Gov. Sarah Palin’s personal attorney denouncing rumors Palin resigned because she is under criminal investigation and threatening legal action for publishing “defamatory” material about the governor.
“I can say definitively I am aware of no criminal investigation whatsoever involving Sarah Palin. Zero,” Palin’s attorney, Thomas Van Flein, said in a phone interview as he attended the Fourth of July festivities in Anchorage.
Earlier in the day, Palin’s personal spokeswoman, Meg Stapleton, sent out a statement from Van Flein attacking “false and defamatory allegations that the ‘real’ reasons for Governor Palin’s resignation stem from an alleged criminal investigation pertaining to the construction of the Wasilla Sports Complex.”
Rumors that Palin steered contracts for the 2003 construction of the Wasilla Sports Complex before leaving office as Wasilla mayor the previous fall, in return for work building her home about the same time, have been around at least since the vice presidential campaign last fall.
They have resurfaced on many websites following her abrupt announcement last week that she will resign from office in three weeks, halfway through her first term.
