Alaska Beacon

A Friday ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court, coupled with an executive order by President Donald Trump, has created doubt about the future of American citizenship for Alaskans who are the children of immigrants.

In a 6-3 decision, the court ruled that U.S. District Court judges cannot issue nationwide preliminary injunctions.

In January, President Donald Trump issued an executive order declaring that the federal government would end birthright citizenship — the awarding of American citizenship to every person born in the United States — for the children of non-citizen immigrants.

The new Supreme Court decision has significant implications for Alaska in particular, because it is not among the states that have legal challenges against Trump’s executive order.

Since 1898, the Fourteenth Amendment has been interpreted by courts as offering birthright citizenship to the children of all American residents, regardless of immigration status.

Trump’s order would change the federal government’s interpretation. It declares that citizenship would be limited to the children of citizens and lawful permanent residents, which would exclude refugees, and other people in the United States temporarily, as well as undocumented immigrants.

That change has been blocked nationwide since January by numerous district court judges.

Friday’s ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court means that those judges can no longer block the order nationwide; they can only block it in states whose district courts are considering lawsuits that challenge the Trump order.

As of Friday, 22 states have legal challenges against the Trump order.

Twenty-eight states, including Alaska, have not. In those states, the Trump administration can start, in 30 days, to begin implementing the executive order, the court said.

The court did not rule on the constitutionality of the Trump administration’s executive order, which could be overturned at a later date.

Neither the office of Gov. Mike Dunleavy nor Attorney General Treg Taylor answered emailed questions asking whether they intend to file a lawsuit in order to protect newborn Alaskans’ citizenship.

Mara Kimmel, the executive director of the Alaska chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said by email that her organization “anticipates this decision could have devastating impacts in Alaska and we are monitoring this very closely as we determine a path forward to protect Alaskan families.”

Meghan Barker, communications and engagement director for the ACLU of Alaska, said that the ACLU nationally has already filed a class-action lawsuit seeking to represent people nationwide, including Alaskans.

“We’re closely following the situation and litigation to ensure that no Alaskans lose their citizenship,” she said.

After nearly 40 years in Alaska’s state Capitol, Sen. Lyman Hoffman is calling it quits.

On Wednesday, the Bethel Democrat confirmed that he will not seek reelection in 2026 and will end a political career that has left him as the longest-serving state legislator in Alaska history.

“Forty years is enough,” Hoffman said on Wednesday.

“I’m going to go back and become a civilian, and I’m going to talk with Rep. Edgmon and encourage him to file for my seat,” Hoffman said, referring to Speaker of the House Bryce Edgmon, I-Dillingham.

Hoffman was elected to the state House in 1986 and to the state Senate in 1994. That year, his closest opponent was Edgmon.

“He’s from the region. He’s been in politics for over 20 years. I think we would have more continuity in having a seasoned person to represent the Senate district,” Hoffman said of Edgmon.

By text message, Edgmon said he is “taking a serious look” at running for Senate.

“Senator Hoffman’s announcement today was not unexpected; however, it still comes as a bit of a gut punch because of what he has meant not just to rural Alaska but to the state as a whole,” Edgmon said. “His departure is going to be a huge loss to the Legislature.”

Hoffman confirmed that he doesn’t intend to run for governor or any other office.

“The family life — that’s the toughest part. Leaving home, leaving family, leaving friends for three to six months out of every year, it puts a big strain,” he said. “So a lot of kudos out to my wife Lillian for putting up with me to do what I love to do.”

In a 15-minute phone interview, Hoffman reflected on his career, saying that in addition to a law that requires the state to fund rural schools, his biggest achievements were those related to energy. He successfully created an endowment fund for the Power Cost Equalization program, which subsidizes rural power costs, and that endowment now is worth more than $1 billion.

Other successes also were related to energy.

“We passed legislation to set up a weatherization program, and we’ve weatherized over $600 million worth of homes,” he said.

If the trans-Alaska natural gas pipeline is built, 20% of gas-sale royalties will be reserved for rural energy development, thanks to Hoffman’s work.

“I think that overall, the work I’ve done on energy is probably the most important thing,” he said.

Asked what has changed in the Capitol during his 40 years, he said the power of rural legislators is now taken for granted. Earlier in his career, it wasn’t.

For the past 10 years, rural legislators have played a kingmaking role in the closely divided state House and Senate, frequently determining whether a Republican-led coalition or a Democratic-led coalition controls each body.

“There were times when rural Alaska wasn’t at the table, and I think that’s the biggest change,” Hoffman said.

“Even if you talk to urban legislators, I think the caliber of and the participation of rural legislators is well respected today,” he said.

When asked what advice he would give a new legislator, he said that it’s important to know that “the relationships you make directly affect your influence,” so it’s important to make friends.

“The top people that are out there — Senator (Gary) Stevens, Senator (Bert) Stedman, Senator (Donny) Olson. All of us have over 20 years of experience in the Senate, and we are good friends, and so I think it’s all about relationships and keeping your word to each other.”

During his time in office, the state’s population has grown, as has the influence of Alaska Native corporations, including Native health corporations.

“I’m chairman of the Bethel Native Corporation, and have been for around 30 years. Our wealth has multiplied by 20-fold. You know, I think that in the state … Native corporations have changed the state of Alaska for the better,” he said.

As he prepares to leave office, Hoffman said he thinks the state’s biggest unresolved issue is the affordability of living in Alaska, particularly with regard to the cost of energy.

“That’s why I spent so much time on it,” he said of energy issues.

“The unfinished business, I think the biggest one that is going to have a major impact on energy, is the gas line,” he said.

The high cost of energy in rural Alaska is also why he’s been interested in micronuclear reactors.

“Right now, people in rural Alaska are spending up to 50-60% of their disposable income on energy, and if they had that 50-60% reduced down to 10%, that would be a windfall to them, and that would change the way people look at Alaska, because it’s in many instances, it’s pretty expensive to live here because of energy,” he said.

“If we can crack the energy equation in the next two decades, I think that’s going to change the face of Alaska.”

The U.S. Senate voted unanimously on June 18 to resume the federal Secure Rural Schools program, which sent millions of dollars to small Alaska schools each year until Congress failed to reauthorize it in 2023.

Congress passed the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act in 2000, which launched the program as a way to help logging towns cope with the loss of revenue caused by a slowdown in logging on nearby federal land.

In 2023, it directed more than $250 million to communities nationwide and over $12.6 million to Alaska towns.

But in 2024, a reauthorization bill stalled in the House of Representatives, and the program ended. In the wake of that failure, some rural schools in Alaska, particularly in Southeast Alaska, have suffered significant budget cuts.

This spring, the Alaska Legislature voted by a 56-4 margin to approve a resolution that calls on Congress to renew the program.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, cosponsored a reauthorization bill, and the Senate approved it last week.

“If you’re a city manager building a budget or a school administrator looking at new hires, you need financial certainty. That’s why renewing the Secure Rural Schools program before funding lapses has been one of my top priorities in this Congress, and today was a crucial step in that process,” Murkowski said in a written statement. “I hope my colleagues in the House will quickly pass this legislation to provide stability for Alaska’s schools and local governments.”

The federal Board of Geographic Names has rejected a proposal to name a summit in Denali National Park and Preserve after a longtime mining pioneer.

Michele Stevens, daughter of Carola June Young, proposed naming the peak “Mount Carola” to honor her mother, and the proposal had been supported by the Talkeetna Historical Society, the Matanuska-Susitna Borough Planning Commission, the Alaska Miners Association and the Alaska Historical Commission, which voted 6-1 to support the nomination.

But on June 12, the domestic names committee of the U.S. Board on Geographic Names rejected the nomination. The board, along with the secretary of the interior, is responsible for maintaining geographic names in the country.

Wendy Sailors, community engagement manager for Alaska State Parks, said that the federal board rejected the Mount Carola name because it violated the policy for names in wilderness areas.

That policy states in part that the board “will not approve proposed names for unnamed features within wilderness areas, including unpublished names in local use, unless an overriding need can be demonstrated by the proponent.”

The unnamed mountain that was to be christened Mount Carola is located just inside the southern border of Denali National Park, inside an “eligible wilderness” area.

That area was added to the original McKinley National Park in 1980 as part of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act.

Eligible wilderness is not designated wilderness but is managed to preserve its wilderness character, according to National Park Service policy.

Sailors said that the National Park Service did not support the Mount Carola name, and its opposition was shared with federal board members before the final vote.

It is somewhat unusual for an Alaska name nomination to be rejected at the federal level because names must be vetted by the Alaska Historical Commission beforehand.

In December, the federal board approved the names for Arkose Peak and Souvenir Peak in the Hatcher Pass Planning Area. Those names had been suggested by local skiers and mountaineers to clear up a discrepancy between local use and what was actually listed on the map.

On July 10, the board is expected to take up the renaming of “Nazi Creek” and “Nip Hill” in the Aleutians. Those landmarks, on the southeastern side of Little Kiska Island, were federally named in World War II and are expected to be renamed using local Unangax terminology.

Both are located within the Aleutian Islands Wilderness of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge.

Less than an hour after President Donald Trump announced that the United States had bombed three Iranian nuclear facilities, Alaska Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan said he supported the decision.

In a written statement posted on the social media site X, Sullivan said he commends the president.

“The terrorist leaders of Iran have, in essence, been at war with the United States for decades — targeting, wounding and killing thousands of American service members for years,” Sullivan wrote.

Sullivan, a former Marine Corps officer, has repeatedly called for aggressive actions against Iran, particularly amid Iran’s support of anti-American militias during the Iraq War. Five years ago, he supported Trump’s decision to assassinate an Iranian general in Iraq.

Sullivan and U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, previously supported Trump’s decision in 2018 to withdraw from a diplomatic agreement intended to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

International experts and Tulsi Gabbard, Director of National Intelligence under Trump, have said that no evidence has been produced showing that Iran is building a nuclear weapon.

Trump himself has said he does not believe Gabbard, and Sullivan, a member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services, spoke this week in that committee, implying that he would support military action in order to deter Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.

He reiterated that position after the Trump-ordered bombing.

“Making sure the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism never gets a nuclear weapon is part of the work of reestablishing deterrence against Iran, which was lost during the appeasement of the Biden Administration. This is difficult work, but critical for our national security. I fully support the President and his national security team in these critical efforts,” he wrote.

Murkowski, Alaska’s senior U.S. senator, did not comment about the strike until hours later, after Trump had delivered a speech about the attack.
“President Trump’s decision to carry out focused strikes on Iran’s nuclear infrastructure makes clear that the international community will not tolerate a nuclear-armed Iran. I commend all those who executed this mission with precision and professionalism,” she wrote in a post on social media.
A Murkowski spokesperson said he expected a longer statement on Sunday.

Rep. Nick Begich III, R-Alaska, spoke about Iran during an interview Friday, one day before the Trump-ordered bombing.

During the interview, he said he had no special knowledge about what would happen in the coming weeks and months but viewed the situation as Iran’s to settle.

“I think the ball is at this moment in Iran’s court: Do they want to be a member of the international community or not? And what’s been made clearly, not just by the United States, but many of our friends and allies around the world, is that we cannot allow them to become a nuclear-armed nation,” Begich said.

“We don’t need another nation, particularly a nation like Iran, to gain the ability to attack with nuclear weapons. We’ve already seen they have hypersonics and are willing to use those. A nuclear-tipped hypersonic would be very difficult to intercept, and it creates an asymmetric capability in a nation that has made quote, “Death to Israel” and “Death to America,” official policy. And when you have a nation saber-rattling like that on a regular basis, actively pursuing a nuclear weapon, it’s a dangerous situation, not just for Israel, not just for the United States, but for the entire world,” he said.

Trump administration job cuts in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration will result in less scientific information that is needed to set and oversee Alaska seafood harvests, agency officials have warned fishery managers.

Since January, the Alaska regional office of NOAA Fisheries, also called the National Marine Fisheries Service, has lost 28 employees, about a quarter of its workforce, said Jon Kurland, the agency’s Alaska director.

“This, of course, reduces our capacity in a pretty dramatic fashion, including core fishery management functions such as regulatory analysis and development, fishery permitting and quota management, information technology, and operations to support sustainable fisheries,” Kurland told the North Pacific Fishery Management Council on Thursday.

NOAA’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center, which has labs in Juneau’s Auke Bay and Kodiak, among other sites, has lost 51 employees since January, affecting 6% to 30% of its operations, said director Robert Foy, the center’s director. That was on top of some job losses and other “resource limitations” prior to January, Foy said.

“It certainly puts us in a situation where it is clear that we must cancel some of our work,” he told the council.

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council, meeting in Newport, Oregon, sets harvest levels and rules for commercial seafood harvests carried out in federal waters off Alaska. The council relies on scientific information from NOAA Fisheries and other government agencies.

NOAA has been one of the targets of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, which has been led by billionaire Elon Musk. The DOGE program has summarily fired thousands of employees in various government agencies, in accordance with goals articulated in a preelection report from the conservative Heritage Foundation called Project 2025.

NOAA’s science-focused operations are criticized in Project 2025. NOAA Fisheries, the National Weather Service and other NOAA divisions “form a colossal operation that has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity,” the Project 2025 report said.

The DOGE-led firings and cuts leave Alaska with notably reduced NOAA Fisheries services, Kurland and Foy told council members.

Among the services now compromised is the information technology system that tracks catches during harvest seasons — information used to manage quotas and allocations. “We really have less than a skeleton crew at this point in our IT shop, so it’s a pretty severe constraint,” Kurland said.

Also compromised is the Alaska Fisheries Science Center’s ability to analyze ages of fish, which spend varying amounts of years growing in the ocean. The ability to gather such demographic information, an important factor used by managers to set harvest levels that are sustainable into the future, is down 40%, Foy said.

A lot of the center’s salmon research is now on hold as well.

For example, work at the Little Port Walter Research Station, the oldest year-round research station in Alaska, is now canceled, Foy said. “We’re talking about the importance of understanding what’s happening with salmon in the marine environment and its interaction with ground fish stocks,” he said.

Much of the work at Little Port Walter, located about 85 miles south of Juneau, has focused on Chinook salmon and the reasons for run declines, as well as the knowledge needed to carry out U.S.-Canada Pacific Salmon Treaty obligations.

As difficult as the losses have been, Kurland and Foy said they are bracing for even more cuts and trying to figure out how to narrow their focus on the top priorities.

Despite the challenges, Foy said, the Alaska Fisheries Science Center has managed to cobble together scheduled 2025 fish surveys in the Bering Sea and Gulf of Alaska, which produce the stock information needed to set annual harvest limits. Some of the employees doing that work have been pulled out of other operations to fill in for experienced researchers who have been lost, and data analysis from the fish surveys will be slower, he warned.

“You can’t lose 51 people and not have that impact,” he said.

It was far from a given that the surveys would happen this year, Foy said. The science center team had to endure a lot of confusion leading up to now, he said.

“We’ve had staff sitting in airports on Saturdays, not knowing if the contract was done to start a survey on a Monday,” he said.

Pressure for bigger harvests

At the same time the Trump administration is making deep cuts to science programs, it also is pushing fishery managers to increase total seafood harvests.

President Donald Trump on April 17 issued an executive order called “Restoring American Seafood Competitiveness” that seeks to overturn “restrictive catch limits” and “unburden our commercial fishermen from costly and inefficient regulation.”

Federal fishing laws, including the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, require careful management to keep fisheries sustainable into the future. Unregulated fisheries have collapsed in the past, leading to regional economic disasters.

Part of the impetus for the executive order, a senior NOAA official told the council, is the long-term decrease in overall seafood landings.

Prior to 2020, about 9.5 billion pounds of seafood was harvested commercially each year, said Sam Rauch, NOAA Fisheries’ deputy assistant administrator for regulatory programs. Now that total is down to about 8.5 billion pounds, Rauch said.

He acknowledged that the COVID-19 pandemic played a role in the reduction, as did economics.

At their Newport meeting, council members raised concerns that the push for increased production might clash with the practices of responsible management, especially if there is less information to prevent overharvesting.

Nicole Kimball, a council member and vice president of a trade organization representing seafood processors, cited a “disconnect” between the goal of increased seafood harvests and the “drastically lower resources” that managers normally rely upon to ensure harvest sustainability.

The typical approach is to be cautious when information is scarce, she noted. “if we have increased uncertainty — which we’ll have with fewer surveys or fewer people on the water — then we usually have more risk, and we account for that by lowering catch,” she said at the meeting.

In response, Rauch cited a need to cut government spending in general and NOAA spending in particular. That includes the agency’s fishery science work, he said.

“We have to think about new and different ways to collect the data,” he said. “The executive order puts a fine point on developing new and innovative but also less expensive ways to collect the science.”

Even before this year, he said, NOAA was struggling with the increasing costs of its Alaska fish surveys and facing a need to economize.

The agency had already been working on a survey modernization program prior to the second Trump administration.

The Alaska portion of the program, announced last year, was intended to redesign fisheries surveys within five years to be more cost-effective and adaptive to changing environmental conditions.

Foy, in his testimony to the council, said job and budget cuts will now delay that modernization work.

“I can almost assuredly say that this is no longer a 5-year project but probably moving out and into the 6- or 7-year” range, he told the council.

Since Alaska accounts for about 60% of the volume of the nation’s commercial seafood catch, it is likely to have a big role in accomplishing the administration’s goals for increased production, council members noted.

Alaska’s total volume has been affected by a variety of forces in recent years. Those include two consecutive years of the Bering Sea snow crab fishery being canceled. That harvest had an allowable catch of 45 million pounds in the 2020-2021 season but wound up drastically reduced in the following year and shot down completely in the 2022-23 and 2023-2024 seasons because of a collapse in the stock.

Another factor is the shrinking size of harvested salmon.

Last year, Bristol Bay sockeye salmon were measured at the smallest size on record. The total 2024 Alaska salmon harvest of 101.2 million fish, one of the lowest totals in recent years, had a combined weight of about 450 million pounds.

Past years with similar sizes harvests by fish numbers yielded higher total weights. The 1987 Alaska salmon harvest of 96.6 million fish weighed a total 508.6 million pounds, while the 1988 Alaska salmon harvest of 100.6 million fish weighed in at 534.5 million pounds, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.