Sarah Palin is the governor of the U.S. state of Alaska and the Republican Party's vice-presidential nominee for the 2008 United States presidential election.
Palin was a member of the Wasilla, Alaska city council from 1992 to 1996 and mayor from 1996 to 2002. After an unsuccessful campaign for lieutenant governor of Alaska in 2002, she chaired the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission from 2003 to 2004. She was elected governor of Alaska in November 2006 by defeating the incumbent governor in the Republican primary and then defeating a former two-term Democratic governor in the general election. She is the first female governor of Alaska, and the youngest person elected to the position.
Republican presidential candidate John McCain announced he had chosen Palin as his running mate on August 29, 2008, and she was formally nominated at the 2008 Republican National Convention in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She is the first woman to run on the Republican Party's presidential ticket and the first Alaskan nominee of either major party.