The group responsible for drafting Measure 2 is shutting down its operations in North Dakota, said a former spokesman for Americans for Prosperity on Thursday.

"They told me on Nov. 10 that they were suspending operations in North Dakota and that I was no longer representing AFP," said Dustin Gawrylow, a former spokesman for the anti-tax organization who was based in Bismarck.

"What I had heard was, and I was told this by the folks at the top, that it just wasn't feasible to keep going in the state."

But Ed Frank, vice president of public affairs for AFP, said that's not the case, also calling online speculation that the anti-tax group is shutting down operations in eight other states as "utterly false."

"We haven't suspended operations, we're going through a staff change and we plan to be fighting for the taxpayers in North Dakota for a long time to come," Frank said.

He would not comment on why Gawrylow no longer works for AFP or detail the organization's plans for its North Dakota operations.

Gawrylow said the organization had internal personality conflicts as well as "fundraising issues."

"It was all sorts of things," he said.

Gawrylow said he is now starting a new organization in the same vein as AFP called North Dakota Taxpayers Association. He said there are no financial or operational connections to AFP and that the new group will be registered as a state PAC.

Duane Sand, who directed the North Dakota chapter of AFP until March, said he was aware of the changes and had no comment about his future in the organization.

Sand lost his third congressional race on Nov. 4, his second to Democratic Rep. Earl Pomeroy.

"I think there are going to be many more people who are going to want to come out and challenge Earl Pomeroy," Sand said of the 2010 race. "I don't know if I'll be one of them."

(Reach reporter Brian Duggan at 223-8482 or brian.duggan@;bismarcktribune.com.)