:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/adn/DX7XRNK3VFB4DNEL3FQ4ZOD6BU.JPG)
Glenn Clary, chairman of the Alaska Republican Party, will move to Virginia for a job with Liberty University, he confirmed by text message Monday night.
Clary said he has not yet resigned as chairman of the party and does not yet have an end date.
“I need to finish up a few things,” he said.
Clary’s move was first reported by the conservative website Must Read Alaska.
A pastor at Anchorage Baptist Temple, Clary will be following former ABT minister Jerry Prevo. Prevo became president of Liberty University in August after the departure of former president Jerry Falwell Jr.
Clary became the top official of Alaska’s largest political party in 2018, after chairman Tuckerman Babcock became chief of staff to Gov. Mike Dunleavy.
Babcock said he does not intend to seek the party’s lead role again, and he wished Clary well in his move.
The former chairman said that under party rules, the Republican vice chair automatically becomes the new party leader upon Clary’s resignation. If that resignation takes place before the next meeting of the State Central Committee, the committee will elect a new vice-chair.
Vice chair Ann Brown of Fairbanks declined to be interviewed Monday.
As chairman of the Alaska Republican Party, Clary has encouraged the state’s 40 Republican districts to act independently and has generally attempted to follow a “big tent” approach to the party at a statewide level in order to avoid antagonizing the party’s different factions.
That position came to a head earlier this month when several districts asked the state party to censure U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, in part because of her vote to impeach former President Donald Trump.
Before the vote, Clary took to talk radio to speak against the idea of a censure. But on the day of the vote, it passed 53-17.
According to the resolution, the party — and now, its new chair — will attempt to recruit a Republican challenger to face Murkowski in the 2022 election.