Mary Peltola’s revolving door just spun again at Holland & Hart

By SUZANNE DOWNING

Mary Peltola quietly exited Holland & Hart about the same time she launched her US Senate campaign.

The timing? No coincidence. She was not performing well there.

After losing her House seat in 2024, Peltola was quickly scooped up by the powerful lobbying and law firm, hired not for her legal work but for her political connections and perceived influence. Former members of Congress are marketed as rainmakers — people who open doors, attract clients, and bring in business. That was the expectation when she arrived.

According to multiple sources familiar with her short time at the firm, none of that happened.

In roughly a year at Holland & Hart, Peltola reportedly brought in no clients, generated no billable work, and produced no revenue. Instead, she cost the firm hundreds of thousands of dollars in salary, benefits, travel, and overhead, reportedly more than $400,000 in salary alone. That’s not unusual for a short ramp-up period. What is unusual is when the ramp never happens.

At the same time, the firm was saddled with a different kind of baggage: the ongoing political speculation surrounding her. For months, Peltola was the subject of constant chatter. Would she run for Senate? Governor? Both? Neither? Every move she made was filtered through that question.

Law firms prize discretion and predictability. What they got instead was a full-time political figure-in-waiting. It just wasn’t worth it for Holland & Hart.

Now she’s gone. So is Anton McParland, her former congressional chief of staff who joined her at the firm. Both were scrubbed from the Holland & Hart website. Click their former profile links and you get a blunt “404 Not Found.”

The departure says plenty on its own.

Peltola’s supporters like to sell her as a hardworking, bipartisan bridge-builder. Alaskans who paid attention during her time in Washington saw something else: Long absences (bathroom breaks), poor attendance, minimal legislative output, and a lifestyle that leaned more toward socializing than governing. She also has a reputation for being a screamer at her staff. That reputation followed her into the private sector, where results are not optional.

Now she has found a new way to get a paycheck: running for Senate.

Federal campaigns pay their candidates. Salaries are legal and can be substantial. A Senate race that stretches to November conveniently provides a steady income stream for nearly a year, funded by donors who think they are financing a comeback rather than underwriting a personal bridge job. Maybe by then, her lawsuit against the company for whom her late husband was flying will be settled, along with her lawsuit involving Buzzy Peltola’s estate.

Peltola may sell herself as the scrappy underdog. In reality, she is once again living off the political industrial complex that never seems to let its own go broke.

And right on cue, Alaska Survey Research has announced she is “leading” Sen. Dan Sullivan.

That name should sound familiar. It is the same pollster that, in late October of 2014, declared Democrat Mark Begich comfortably ahead of challenger Dan Sullivan just days before Begich lost by a clear margin. The numbers were wrong then and they are designed the same way now.

Alaska Survey Research does not measure momentum. It’s job is to manufacture momentum for the Left.

Democratic donors in the Lower 48 read those polling headlines and open their wallets. Media outlets repeat the talking point. The campaign raises more money. Rinse and repeat.

Mary Peltola’s exit from Holland & Hart tells a story far more grounded in reality than any glossy poll release. A high-priced political hire has failed to perform, has burned through cash, been shown the door and has moved on to the next paycheck source.

Suzanne Downing is founder and editor of The Alaska Story