Alaska Public Media

Former Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor filed to join the 2026 race for governor on Wednesday. Taylor is the 10th Republican to enter the race to replace his former boss, Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who is term-limited.

Taylor was Dunleavy’s attorney general for more than four years and, in an interview, he said he could hit the ground running.

“I know what the issues are that we face,” he said. “We definitely need to get the economy moving again. We need to create good-paying jobs. We need affordable, reliable sources of energy and to get the cost of living down, and we need to get Juneau working again and not be politics as usual.”

Taylor touted his work challenging the Biden administration, especially on resource development, and his collaboration with the Trump administration. He said he worked with Trump’s team on the president’s Day 1 executive order seeking to ease drilling, mining and logging in the state.

Taylor also cited significant declines in violent crime and sexual assault in the state during his tenure as attorney general.

He said that if elected, he’d seek to attract data centers and other new businesses to the state, echoing a priority of Dunleavy.

“I think that the overall theme from me is going to be not taxing your tax base more, but growing your tax base,” he said.

Taylor also echoed Dunleavy’s approach to improving the state’s education system, saying he would focus on improving students’ performance, rather than seeking to boost funding for public schools. He pointed to “some distinction in the sort of the focus of what elements I would like to see in education, on the accountability side, on the option side” compared to Dunleavy’s approach but said he was still developing the specifics.

Taylor and his family have also backed efforts to allow students to use state homeschool funding to pay for tuition at private and religious schools, the subject of an ongoing lawsuit.

As the state continues to face a budget crunch, Taylor said he’d like to take a “serious look” at the state’s spending. He said he’d also like to scrutinize federal spending that flows to the state.

“What you know some people might call free money, well, it’s not free. It comes with purse strings, one, and two, it’s paid for by taxpayers like you and I,” he said. “We need to look and see what the cost of that money is to the state, and whether those programs and those things are worth (it) to the state.”

Taylor and his wife recently asked state campaign regulators for an exemption from a requirement to disclose the names of tenants paying rent at properties they own in Anchorage, saying disclosure would open the tenants up to harassment. The Alaska Public Offices Commission has yet to decide whether to grant the request.

Taylor joins nine other Republican candidates and one Democrat seeking to succeed Dunleavy.

The top four vote-getters in the August 2026 primary will advance to the general election in November.

Alaskans and, really, the rest of the world can expect a La Niña climate pattern this winter.

That could mean a potentially cooler-than-average winter.

According to the National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center, there’s a 71 percent chance of a La Niña setting in by October. The center updated its forecast Friday from essentially a coin flip chance to now saying a La Niña is more likely than not.

What that means for Alaska is still unclear, National Weather Service climate researcher Brian Brettschneider said.

“It, historically, would generally mean cooler falls in Alaska and cooler winters. That hasn’t worked out the last couple of times,” Brettschneider said. “And so I like to say that it puts the thumb on the scale, but sometimes that thumb slips off the scale and it just doesn’t work out.”

That’s not just because the Earth’s climate is warmer now than it used to be. A La Niña only accounts for some of the variability across an entire winter. Other things – like increased tropical cyclone activity, sea ice distribution or a polar vortex – can overwhelm that, Brettschneider said.

And even though La Niña winters tend to favor drier conditions, they sometimes produce more snow in Alaska.

“If you have the same amount of precipitation, but it’s colder, then you get more snow,” Brettschneider said. “You’re converting more of the would-be rain into snow. And then also, generally, when it’s colder, to a point, you get more efficient snow crystal production, and so you get fluffier snow.”

In Anchorage, one of the top three snowiest winters on record was a La Niña, while another was its counterpart El Niño, which tends to produce warmer, wetter winters.

And, Brettschneider said, the warmest winter on record in Alaska was during a La Niña. So the climate prediction can’t say what will happen, only what is likely to happen, he said.

Industry leaders say a “renaissance” is underway on the North Slope. Major projects are well on their way to production, and oil companies say they’re planning to expand even further, helping to reverse a long-running decline in production in the Arctic.

Construction is well underway on high-profile oil development projects like ConocoPhillips’ Willow and Santos and Repsol’s Pikka. Both of those stand to substantially boost the amount of oil flowing south.

At the Alaska Oil and Gas Association’s annual conference last month, ConocoPhillips’ Donald Allan said Willow remains on track to start production in 2029.

“It’s a super exciting time for Alaska,” he said. “We have big projects happening right now. We have a whole new play ramping up, and there’s more to come with our exploration season and future projects.”

Meanwhile, Santos VP of Business Development Peter Laliberte shared the news that the Pikka project is running months ahead of schedule and is more than 90% complete. It’s on track to produce its first barrel of oil in the first quarter of next year, he said.

“Once we start up, we’ll ramp up about mid-year,” he said. “We’ll ramp up to 80,000 barrels a day, and by then, we’re going to be looking on for the next project.”

An additional 80,000 barrels a day would boost North Slope production by nearly 20% from where it is right now.

What does that mean for the state’s economy — and the state’s stretched budget?

“I look at it as all positive,” said Sitka Republican state Sen. Bert Stedman, one of the top budgeters in the state Legislature. “Quite frankly, this is just the beginning. There’s going to be probably a decade of build-out going on on the Slope.”

It’s a boon for the economy, he said, and a welcome source of relief for the state budget. Pikka — which, importantly, is on state-owned land, and thus generates more state revenue than projects on federal land — is likely to yield more than $200 million for the state in its first year, according to an analysis from the state revenue department.

That’s a significant, though not life-changing, chunk of change for the state, Stedman said. For comparison, the education funding boost lawmakers approved this session cost about $170 million.

“It’s not going to be, you know, you’re in euphoria because you have massive surpluses in your budget or anything like that, but it’s definitely positive,” he said. “You want to take multiple steps like this forward, then they all add up to definitely helping the state balance its budget.”

Higher-than-expected oil prices are also providing a lift to the budget, he said.

Sen. Bill Wielechowski, an Anchorage Democrat, said the surge in North Slope activity is, indeed, good news. But not as good as it could be.

“Absolutely, $200 million, of course, happy to see it. It will help the budget,” he said. “But when you compare it to what other jurisdictions are getting, it is nowhere near what we should be getting.”

He pointed to oil-producing states like Texas and North Dakota, which have substantially higher tax and royalty rates than Alaska. Of course, the fact that most of Alaska’s oil comes from the remote North Slope, where costs are high, complicates the picture.

“We can’t even afford to fund our schools. We’ve got schools falling in the ocean. We’ve got communities that still have honey buckets. We can’t maintain our roads, we can’t plow our roads,” he said. “We have colossally mismanaged our oil wealth in the state of Alaska.”

Wielechowski said lawmakers should make changes to the state’s tax and royalty system to take advantage of the surge in activity. For one thing, he said he’d like to prevent companies from deducting investments on federal land — like Willow — from the state taxes they owe on other projects. State revenue officials recently cut the state’s projected income from Willow by half.

“Why should we subsidize that?” he said. “Why should the state of Alaska be subsidizing hundreds of millions to billions of dollars for production, for exploration costs, drilling costs, for which we get zero royalties, for which we get very little in production taxes?”

Wielechowski has backed a number of bills that would stiffen the state’s oil and gas taxes, though they have yet to advance to a final vote.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Bernadette Wilson announced Tuesday that state Senate Minority Leader Mike Shower, a Wasilla Republican, would join her ticket as her pick for lieutenant governor.

Shower is a conservative who has served in the state Senate since 2018. He’s a commercial cargo pilot and retired Air Force officer. He has focused some of his legislative work on election security, though his reforms have largely failed to find support in the state Legislature.

Wilson highlighted that work in a statement, calling him a “deeply respected conservative leader.” If elected, Shower would be responsible for administering state election laws and appointing the director of the Division of Elections.

In a statement, Shower called Wilson “the clear choice to be Alaska’s next Governor.”

Wilson is a business owner, conservative activist and former talk radio host. She has never held elected office and pitches herself as an outsider.

When former foster youth Matthew Vandenberg took the stand in a downtown courtroom on the first day of a federal trial, he told the judge about a foster placement he and other foster youth called the “ramen house.” He recounted his testimony in an interview.

“The people there were to give you two ramen packs a day, and if you ate them, say, in the morning, because you were hungry, you would have to wait until the next day to eat again.” Vandenberg said. “I lost over 30 pounds being at that foster home.”

Alaska’s Office of Children’s Services is defending its practices in a federal court case that began Aug. 25 in Anchorage. A national organization, A Better Childhood, brought the class-action lawsuit hoping to force court-mandated reforms to a system it says is failing Alaska kids. It’s a strategy the group says has worked in other states.

Vandenberg testified that he moved foster placements about 13 times over four years. He also testified that at one placement he missed school because he was forced to clean the home’s cul-de-sac instead, and at another he was denied medical treatment for a broken finger. OCS staff are supposed to visit kids in their care monthly, partly to make sure kids aren’t mistreated.

But attorney Marcia Lowry, the director of A Better Childhood, said those monthly visits in Alaska just aren’t happening, putting kids like Vandenberg at risk. The nonprofit is based in New York and brings lawsuits against states across the country to push for foster care reforms.

“How else can you know whether a child is safe when you put a child in a foster home? How can you know when it’s time to move a child to get freed for adoption?” Lowry said. “The visits with both children and with parents are very, very low.”

Lowry said that on many federal measures, Alaska’s foster care system ranks among the worst in the country. Alaska has fewer caseworkers visiting children, longer child protection response times, shorter average placements, and more children maltreated while in state custody, according to data submitted as evidence in the case. And Lowry said the state has not taken the necessary steps to correct problems in the system.

“Alaska is one of the few places that I know of that hires workers who don’t have college degrees,” Lowry said. “Nice, well-intentioned people can’t just do this job. They need an education.”

Lowry said lawsuits like this can be an effective way to force system reforms. She said her organization has sued 11 other states in the last decade to improve foster care systems. It’s won four of those suits, with eight more ongoing.

When the group sued New Jersey in 1999, Lowry said, its system was one of the worst in the country. Now it’s one of the best.

“There was a court order entered, and there was monitoring provided, and New Jersey, over a period of time, reformed its system and had to go into court periodically and report on whether or not it was doing that, and that helped with the legislature,” she said. “The legislature then was required to appropriate more money.”

Alaska’s foster care system has long been plagued with serious problems. Caseloads for caseworkers are often several times the expert-recommended maximum and the state reports high turnover, which experts say creates worse outcomes for kids.

In 2018, a law required reforms meant to reduce caseloads and staff turnover, with mandatory audits to check on progress. The final audit released this year showed that by most measures, OCS hasn’t made meaningful progress. But those involved in bringing this class-action lawsuit to trial hope that if they win, it could actually force change.

Alicia Groh, a national expert in child welfare systems, testified in the federal trial. She said a wide variety of things can bring about change in a child welfare system and she agrees lawsuits can be effective.

“In some states, it is a lawsuit, or the beginnings of a lawsuit, that prompts a state to say, ‘We need to look at this differently. We need to take a very significant action to address these concerns,'” Groh said.

But she said strong leadership is also an important piece of the puzzle.

The Office of Children’s Services declined an interview for this story while the trial is taking place. But in her testimony, OCS Director Kim Guay consistently pointed out that her office is just one piece of Alaska’s child welfare system. She acknowledged case loads can be high, but said the state can’t implement caseload caps because her office can’t turn away kids or families who need help.

Margaret Paton-Walsh, assistant attorney general who is defending the state in the trial, said one of the main problems is that Alaska has a serious caseworker shortage.

“Our perspective is child welfare work is really hard,” Paton-Walsh said. “It’s especially hard in Alaska because of the size and the remoteness of so many of the communities, and we are doing the best that we can to manage the challenges that we have.”

The federal trial is slated to wrap up Sept. 11. There’s no timeline for when the judge will issue her decision.

Alaska’s 2026 governor’s race is becoming a very lopsided affair. While a dozen or so Republicans are either running or believed to be preparing a run, a big question hangs over potential Democratic hopefuls: What will Mary Peltola do?

Nobody has reliable intel, not even Alaska pollster Ivan Moore.

“Well, hang on. Let’s do this: I have three Alaskan buddies here in the car,” he said Monday, when he happened to be driving through western Canada.

He put his phone on mute to do some quick research.

“We had one yes and two nos to the question, ‘Is Mary Peltola going to run for governor?'” he said.

Moore himself is in the yes-she-will camp, making it 50-50 odds in one very unscientific sample.

What does former Alaska congresswoman Mary Peltola say about her plans? She declined to comment for this story. But she attended fundraisers this summer, met with important political players and spoke at the Alaska Democratic Party’s annual picnic, fueling much speculation and inquiry.

Peltola is the only Democrat to win statewide in years. She lost her seat last year to Republican Nick Begich. But Moore said, — based on his real polling, beyond the occupants of his car —that she remains popular. If she enters, Moore said she’d do well in the open primary and would be “overwhelmingly likely” to win one of the four spots on the ranked choice general election ballot in November 2026.

“So it’s kind of an awkward situation: Do you wait for Mary or do you get in?” Moore said, channeling the dilemma other Democratic hopefuls are in. “And if you get in, do you say that you’ll get out if she gets in? Because no one wants to just be in a race to lose it. No one wants to take money away from Mary.”

As he sees it, Alaska Democrats have an innate culture of not competing against each other, because they can’t afford to. There are fewer of them.

The only Democrat to enter the governor’s race so far is former state senator Tom Begich. He pledged to step aside if Peltola runs.

“And I’m hopeful that she will be in a statewide race, too, and that that statewide race will be for the U.S. Senate,” said Begich, who is the uncle of the current Alaska congressman.

Moore polled on the possibility that Peltola might challenge U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan. He found that more respondents had a positive view of Peltola but, in a head-to-head match, Moore’s poll suggests Sen. Sullivan would win.

Moore described those two findings as “very unusual” and attributes it to the incumbent advantage.

Axios and other news sites reported last month that Senate Minority leader Chuck Schumer is recruiting Peltola to run against Sullivan. That could mean another multi-million contest, with national Republicans spending a ton of money in Alaska to defend what’s otherwise a safe seat for them. The National Republican Senatorial Committee says it’s not worried.

“Chuck Schumer’s best options in red-state Senate races are losers like Mary Peltola,” a spokesman told Axios.

Anchorage political consultant Jim Lottsfeldt, who generally helps Democrats and moderate Republicans, ardently hopes Peltola enters the governor’s race.

“I think she will just sail far and above everybody else, based on her popularity, her accomplishments, her name ID,” he said. “And the Republicans will be busy in a knife fight amongst the 47 of them to try to get the right to challenge her. It’s sort of a perfect race for her.”

Peltola could spend a year raising money and consolidating support across the left and middle, he said.

“Whereas, with that crowded Republican primary, everybody on that side has to figure out how to get to the second-, third- and fourth-places,” Lottsfeldt said. “And they’re going to be pursuing their niche.”

He figures they’ll take far-right positions to stake out specific GOP lanes to do well in the primary, and then have to walk it back by November.

Alaska AFL-CIO President Joelle Hall said it may feel like potential Democratic candidates are hanging back and waiting for Peltola, but it’s still early. The candidate filing deadline isn’t until June 1, 2026.

“She’s the most electable Democrat in the entire field, and so, yeah, it is natural for everybody to want to know what she’s thinking,” Hall said.

While Peltola lost in 2024, that was a presidential election year. Non-presidential years have lower turnout and Hall said the Alaska voters who stay home skew conservative.

Hall said she doesn’t care which race Peltola files for — governor or U.S. senator — as long as she runs.

“And then when she makes her choice,” Hall said, “we will organize ourselves to try to make the most out of the choice that she makes.”