Anchorage radio show host Mike Porcaro moved to Alaska from New York City 55 years ago and loved it so much that he never left.
He is also a supporter of Donald Trump and believes Friday’s summit between the US President and Russia’s Vladimir Putin will lead to peace in Ukraine.
Porcaro says he understands not everyone supports the US President; indeed, he welcomes a variety of views on his drive-time programme “The Mike Porcaro Show”, which broadcasts from 4pm to 6pm five days a week.
Yet he is baffled by those who want Trump to fail on Friday, given what is at stake.
“You don’t have to like the guy,” Porcaro tells The i Paper. “But I always make the comparison ‘If you’re flying on an airplane, do you want your pilot to fail?’. I’d like to get down, if you don’t mind.”
Porcaro, 77, says the city of Anchorage, with a population of 290,000, has been “buzzing” and that everyone has been talking about the meeting. He says the US Secret Service has been on the scene looking at rooftops and checking out its streets.
While campaigning for a return to the White House, Trump bragged he could secure a peace between Russia and Ukraine in just 24 hours, but he has set expectations lower for the meeting at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters the event was “a listening exercise for the US President.”
Michael O’Hanlon, a Director of Research at the Brookings Institution think-tank in Washington DC, says Trump is correct to try and moderate people’s perceptions.
“He is right to do so, so as not to give Putin leverage,” O’Hanlon said. “If the summit is built up, and only Putin is in a position to make concessions, that increases the risk that Trump would give away the store. Thankfully, Trump seems to have no such intention.”
Some analysts argue that by simply agreeing to a meeting with Putin, a man who has since 2023 has faced an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court (ICC) for alleged war crimes and largely ostracised, Trump is handing him an easy win.
“Putin has already won, especially given the one-on-one segment of the meeting,” Laura Holgate, a former US Ambassador to the United Nations in Vienna, tells The i Paper.
She says Putin will be sure to make the most of the visuals of the two leaders for his domestic audience.
She adds: “The audiences that matter to Putin are Trump himself, the Russian elite, and public opinion. Putin has proven a master manipulator of both, and whatever the reality of what happens, especially since there will be no witnesses, the outcome will be spun by the Kremlin to support their narrative.”
A wall decorated with political messages in Anchorage (Photo: Jae C. Hong/AP)Some were surprised that the two leaders are meeting in the US rather than in a more neutral venue. Reports suggested there was talk that Hungary, a member of Nato but whose leader, Viktor Orban, has a warm relationship with both Trump and Putin, could have hosted the event. The United Arab Emirates was also mentioned.
But experts say the unique role Alaska has played in US-Russian relations over many decades actually makes it perfect. It also means a shorter flight time for both leaders.
Alaska was sold to the US in 1867 for $7.2m (£5.3m), the equivalent today of around $130m (£96m), and has generally been considered an utter bargain given it was made up of around 665,000 square miles.
During World War II, when the Soviet Union was an ally, the US provided billions of dollars of military equipment through Alaska under the so-called Lend-Lease programme to help Putin in his fight against Nazi Germany. The equipment was flown from airfields in Alaska and Canada to Siberia.
Ironically, during the Cold War, bases such as Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson were essential on the frontline of the US’s defences. In the 1950s, American military leaders feared a possible land invasion through Alaska.
During Moscow’s period of “perestroika”, or openness, some Americans tried to reciprocate.
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In August 1987, American Lynne Cox became the first person to swim the Bering Strait, making the journey from Little Diomede Island (USA) to Big Diomede Island (USSR).
Even today, members of indigenous communities can travel without the need for a visa from Alaska to Siberia. There is still cooperation between the US Coastguard and their Russian counterparts.
“Alaska plays a very special role in US-Russian relations,” said Brandon Boylan, a professor of political science at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
“So when it was announced [the summit was being held in Alaska], I wasn’t really surprised at all. If Trump was going to host Putin in the US, and if he wasn’t going to do so at the White House or at Camp David, it made perfect sense it would be in Alaska.”
Boylan points out that over the years, Alaska has hosted plenty of high-level meetings – one in 1971 when President Richard Nixon met Emperor Hirohito, on what was the first time he had travelled outside Japan, and in 1984 when Ronald Reagan spoke to Pope John Paul II in Fairbanks.
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