Guest Opinion.
Alaska’s primary is unusual. And I think a good model for the rest of the country. Not that there are not quirks (more on that later). On Tuesday, four candidates from any party (or even not a party) will advance to the general election and in the fall, the Ranked Choice Voting process.
To read more articles by Mark Trahant, go to: Marktrahant.substack.com
Voters have a lot of choices. There are 17 candidates for governor, two of them are Alaska Native.
What we know: Alaskans are voting early. This from the Alaska Story.
“Alaskans are voting early in numbers far ahead of the pace set during the 2024 primary, an indication that voters are highly engaged in this year’s election. It’s also a warning to campaigns that their supporters cannot afford to take the Aug. 18 primary for granted.
“As of Tuesday, Aug. 11, the Alaska Division of Elections had received 10,078 early votes. At the same point before the 2024 primary — eight days before Election Day of that year — the division had received only 4,298.
“That means early voting this year is running nearly 5,800 ballots ahead of the 2024 pace. It represents an increase of approximately 135%, with this year’s total already reaching 235% of the number recorded at the comparable point two years ago.
“The comparison is especially notable because 2024 was a presidential election year, which typically attracts greater voter excitement and attention. Yet Alaskans are casting ballots much earlier and at a considerably faster rate in the 2026 primary.”
Voting early has been one of the messages in the Alaska Federation of Natives Power of the Native Vote campaign:
“The Alaska Native community is the most powerful voting bloc in the state. Why? Because we have the numbers. Our people make up approximately 20% of the state’s general population. If we vote early (in-person or by mail) or on Election Day, we can determine the direction of Alaska.”
Who’s not running for governor?
Two Alaska Native candidates are running in that group of 17, Republican Bernadette Wilson and independent Meda Dewitt.
“… Wilson is not new to Alaska politics. She’s advocated for conservative causes through work on Republican political campaigns, served as the Alaska director for Americans for Prosperity, and held the interim director position on the conservative think tank, the Alaska Policy Forum.
“Wilson said that she’s tired of excuses from Alaska’s politicians on solving issues from the Permanent Fund dividend and education, to fisheries and the proposed gas line.
“Wilson has family ties to Bristol Bay as a Naknek Native Village Council member, but was raised in Anchorage, where she is majority owner of the garbage company Denali Disposal.”
Wilson is against the Ranked Choice Voting system and her campaign says she is one of the main sponsors of the amendment to repeal Alaska’s voting system. She is Aleut and a member of the Naknek Native Village Council.
Meda DeWitt is Tlingit (Lingít) and a traditional healer, educator, and political organizer from the Naanyaa.aayí clan with roots in Wrangell and Yakutat. She led the unsuccessful 2019 campaign to recall Gov. Mike Dunlevy.
A profile of DeWitt and her running mate, Chris Steere, published last wek in the Nome Nugget:
DeWitt describes their campaign as “Alaskans first” focused. “We don’t have to buy into the national party politics and the squabbles and things, and we don’t have to take direct orders from party leaders and that are out of the state,” she said. “We are both Alaska Native, and we are very committed to the state and having a viable future and a viable present for our children and communities.”
DeWitt’s top priorities are centered around creating a sustainable, self-sufficient Alaska, an approach she calls “holistic.” More specifically, she wants to return manufacturing and food production to Alaska, invest in education that enables Alaskans to work in-state and reduce fuel costs by refining fuel here.
She wants to close the so-called S corporation loophole, which would have companies licensed as S corporations or limited liability companies to pay corporate income tax for profits earned inside Alaska. She wants to keep production and manufacturing in-state. “That means that the dollars are made here and spent here and circulate here. There’s so much money that leaves out of the state. It’s just absolutely ridiculous,” she said.
“It is the most important thing: ending corporate welfare, making the extractive industries pay their due taxes, and by hiring Alaskan workers, that money recirculates back into the economy instead of just leaving with the resources,” added Steere.
This is why a top four primary makes sense to me. There is a wide range of candidates, Democrats, Republicans, independents, and it’s the voters (not the money) that gets to sort through this list and come up with four “maybe” candidates for governor. Then, between August and November, those four will have plenty of time to make their case for election.
Moving on to the Senate.
Mary Peltola, Yup’ik, should advance to the general election along with incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan. The other two spots could be interesting. The Anchorage Daily News reported that millions of dollars are being spent to promote “fringe” candidates that could draw voters away from Peltola or Sullivan.
This is the quirky part. Noise. (This is not a lot of money. Spending in Minnesota’s Democratic primary topped $51 million.)
The thing to watch for is how close Peltola (or for that matter, Sullivan) get to 51 percent. Alaska Survey Research’s latest report shows support for Peltola at 51 percent and Sullivan at 49 percent. If that happens in November, there is no Ranked Choice Voting. Fifty percent, plus one, wins.
And in the House
Like in the Senate race, the two top candidates are the incumbent Republican, Rep. Nick Begich III, and the Democratic challenger Bill Hill. Hill is Dena’ina Athabascan.
The Alaska Current says Hill is running behind at this point.
Alaska’s primary election is less than a week away, but independent congressional candidate Bill Hill’s campaign is already looking ahead to the general election—and they like what they’re seeing.
New polling of the race for Alaska’s lone seat in the US House shows Hill is within the margin of error of freshman Republican US Rep. Nick Begich III, with plenty of room to grow in terms of name recognition. The polling was conducted by Democratic polling firm GBAO, which contacted 500 likely voters between Aug. 3 and 5, with a self-reported margin of error of 4.4%, and shared first with the Alaska Current.
In a head-to-head race, the poll found Begich currently leads Hill 46%-42%.
Hill, a former educator and commercial fisherman who is Alaska Native, is the lone serious contender in the race after Democratic candidate Matt Schultz exited the race in July.
