4 Special Coverage

Republican Nick Begich III maintained his lead over Democratic Congresswoman Mary Peltola after the Division of Elections posted an updated results tally late Tuesday night.

Begich now has about 49% of first-place votes to Peltola’s nearly 46%. That’s a difference of nearly 10,000 votes. If neither of the candidates win more than 50% of first-place votes once all valid ballots are counted, the winner will be determined by ranked choice tabulation on Nov. 20.

Meanwhile, a ballot measure to repeal the state’s open primary and ranked choice voting system remains on track to pass. Though thousands of ballots remain to be counted, yes votes outnumber noes by more than 2,800 votes. That’s a margin of 1 percentage point.

The Alaska Division of Elections is expected to release at least two more result updates: one on Nov. 15 and another on Nov. 20. Tuesday’s included roughly 38,000 new ballots, mostly absentee, early and questioned ballots, plus votes from one Election Day precinct in rural Alaska that had not previously reported its tally. It’s the first large batch of ballots to be added after Election Day as officials process and count votes from within the state and around the world.

The updated results also provide some insight on some key races for state Legislature. The leaders in all races remain unchanged.

Fairbanks Sen. Scott Kawasaki, a Democrat, has increased his lead over Republican challenger Leslie Hajdukovich to more than 350 votes.

And in two key Anchorage House races, Democrats continue to lead. In North Muldoon, challenger Ted Eischeid has widened his margin over incumbent Republican Rep. Stanley Wright to 198 votes. Government Hill and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson Rep. Cliff Groh leads by a razor-thin margin, outpacing challenger David Nelson by just 19 votes.

Wasilla Republican Rep. David Eastman continues to trail fellow Republican challenger Jubilee Underwood. Underwood leads by 216 votes.

The results are expected to strengthen the House and Senate’s bipartisan coalitions. Shortly after Election Day, prospective leaders in each chamber announced they’d secured enough seats to form a majority. The House’s leadership would flip from a Republican-led coalition to a mostly-Democratic caucus led by new Speaker Bryce Edgmon, an independent from Dillingham.

It’s not the final word on the election. Alaska’s vote-counting process is slow. That’s due in part to the long window for absentee votes to arrive.

The count now includes nearly 48,000 absentee votes and nearly 69,000 early votes, plus more than 3,800 questioned ballots, which are cast largely by voters who show up at the wrong precinct on Election Day.

How many votes remained to be counted was not immediately clear Tuesday night. The Division of Elections issued nearly 60,000 absentee ballots, and nearly 14,000 had not arrived by Tuesday.

Final counts aren’t expected until Nov. 20, which is the last day for ballots to arrive from overseas. And even then, the winners won’t be official until the Division of Elections completes error-checking and other post-election procedures. State officials plan to certify the election Nov. 30.

Alaska lawmakers expect bipartisan coalitions to control the state House and Senate when the Alaska Legislature convenes in January, but they don’t know who the state’s governor will be.

Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s second term isn’t over until December 2026, but in a series of interviews, legislators say they believe he may be offered a job in the new administration of President Donald Trump, and in interviews, the governor has indicated that he’s open to taking a job with Trump.

“I think the expectation has been that Gov. Dunleavy will take a position with the Trump administration,” said Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage. “I mean, that’s probably the worst-kept secret in Juneau.”

Senate President Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, said he’s been looking for Dunleavy’s name to be mentioned as a candidate for various cabinet positions, but he hasn’t seen it yet.

In October, Dunleavy told reporter Nat Herz that he hadn’t had a conversation with the president-elect about a job, but that he wouldn’t rule out the possibility.

The governor’s office declined an interview request by email on Thursday and said the governor hasn’t had any discussions with Trump about a cabinet position. A spokesperson referred to a Wednesday TV interview in which the governor said, “I’m more than happy to have a discussion with the President about anything, as long as it can move Alaska forward.”

On Friday, Dunleavy’s social media account shared a video from Trump in which the president-elect said he intends to accelerate development of the long-planned trans-Alaska natural gas pipeline.

“Thank you to your great governor,” Trump said. “We’re going to work together just like we have in the past, and it was a very special relationship, Mike. Thank you very much. I look forward to a long and enduring future relationship.”

If Dunleavy were to leave office, Article III, Section 11, of the state constitution would kick in automatically, and Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom would become governor. The state’s adjutant general, Torrence Saxe, is currently the No. 3 person in the state’s line of succession, and he would become lieutenant governor. Saxe leads the Alaska National Guard and the state Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.

There wouldn’t be a special election unless Dahlstrom were to also leave office, making Saxe governor.

Wielechowski said that if Dunleavy leaves, it could be a net positive for progress on a variety of issues where lawmakers have significantly different views from the governor.

Last year, legislators overwhelmingly passed a bill that would have permanently increased funding for public schools. Dunleavy vetoed it, and lawmakers failed by a single vote to override that veto.

Dunleavy also vetoed a swath of projects from the Legislature-passed budget and a series of policy bills, some of which passed by wide margins.

“I think the governor has burned a lot of bridges with the Legislature in the last few years,” Wielechowski said. “I think the state’s due for a fresh start there.”

Rep. Andrew Gray, D-Anchorage, offered a similar view on Election Day in a streamed broadcast, saying that if Dunleavy were to join Trump in Washington, “that is a silver lining for Alaska.”

Stevens said he’s trying to stay prepared to work with whoever occupies the governor’s office in January.

“If he’s still here, we’ve got to work with him. He’s the governor, and he stays through the next two years. We’ve got to find a way to make it work, and we haven’t in the past. You know, he’s vetoed our budgets. He’s not agreed with us in so many areas, so that’s a real concern. We’ve got to make sure that we are able to work with him. So I don’t — the last thing I want to do is offend the governor,” he said.

“If you want things to work for Alaska, you’ve got to work together. So we’re prepared to work with whoever the governor is,” said Rep. Louise Stutes, R-Kodiak and the House’s incoming rules chair.

Asked whether Dunleavy had burnt his bridges with the Legislature, Stutes said she doesn’t personally think so.

“My job is to represent my constituents and work with whoever the governor might be, and if he hurt my feelings last year, let’s start over this year.”

A Dunleavy departure wouldn’t be without precedent: former Alaska Gov. Wally Hickel left office in 1969 to become secretary of the Interior for President Richard Nixon.

Nixon fired Hickel from the job after about a year.

During his first term in office, Trump didn’t announce his cabinet picks until late November or early December.

Sen. Löki Tobin, D-Anchorage, said she doesn’t know whether Trump will appoint Dunleavy, and “If I’m looking at a crystal ball, I don’t really have an answer other than that the president cannot appoint their cabinet until Congress is seated, and that means after the inauguration, and so I anticipate on Dec. 15, we will have a budget from Gov. Dunleavy,” she said. “I anticipate when I swear into office, Gov. Dunleavy will still be our sitting governor. And after that, I don’t know what will happen, but either way, I am preparing myself for an administration in the state of Alaska, who is in a different political party than myself and may have different views.”

Unofficial results from the Division of Elections earlier this week showed one Southeast Alaska precinct seemed to overwhelmingly choose a peculiar candidate for the U.S. House — a man currently imprisoned in New York. 

Those results confused voters from the communities, who said that didn’t line up with how they voted. 

When Pelican resident Patricia Phillips tuned in to the radio Thursday morning to catch up on the news, she said something caught her ear. 

“It said that there were zero votes for Mary Peltola in Pelican, Elfin Cove. And I went ‘That’s strange,” she said. 

She said she thought the news report she heard couldn’t be right. 

“I know for sure there were two votes for Mary Peltola. I came into the city office on Election Day and I voted,” she said.

Phillips said she and her husband voted for Democratic Congresswoman Mary Peltola. Phillips has lived in Pelican for 50 years and went for Peltola in the last two elections. And she wasn’t sure why early reports showed that Democratic candidate Eric Hafner had more than half of the vote in her precinct.

She didn’t even know who he was. 

“I saw the results and I was wondering that maybe there was some sort of a clerical error that they put him down for that person instead of for Mary,” she said.

Pelican and Elfin Cove are home to about 122 year-round residents combined, according to census data. The pair of communities share a single precinct for general elections at Pelican’s City Hall. 

On Wednesday and Thursday, Division of Elections data showed that 40 ballots had been counted for the 156 registered voters in the area. The results showed that the area had swayed heavily in favor of Hafner for U.S. House – and that no one voted for Peltola.

But, that wasn’t the full picture. By Thursday afternoon, the vote tally changed. 

Elections Director Carol Beecher said Friday morning that the results her division initially reported were incorrect and the error happened at the Juneau director’s office during input. The count was corrected Thursday to reflect the actual vote tally.

The incorrect data the state and news outlets reported on Wednesday was astonishing for a few reasons. At that time, Peltola had more than 50% of the vote for the precincts surrounding Pelican and Elfin Cove – Sitka, Tenakee Springs and Hoonah.

Hafner on the other hand, received less than 3% of those votes. Across the state, he had only about 1%. 

Hafner is one of three candidates running to unseat Peltola. He also happens to be serving a decades-long sentence in a prison in New York for threatening public officials. When KRBD’s Jack Darrell interviewed him earlier this year, Hafner said he’s never been here. 

“I think I have a very good reason right now that I simply can’t come to Alaska,” he said. 

A Thursday afternoon update on the Division of Elections website showed that no one had voted for him after all. The Division of Elections changed his 24 votes to zero on the state’s interactive voter website and reported that Peltola led the race instead. 

Hafner being on the ballot was a concern for the Alaska Democratic Party. They argued his presence could lead to voter confusion. It even sparked a lawsuit earlier this year that challenged his eligibility. The Alaska Supreme Court affirmed his candidacy in September.

In Alaska, vote counts are slow — by Friday morning, four Alaska precincts still hadn’t reported their results. Statewide, results won’t be certified until Nov. 30. 

There are still tens of thousands of votes across the state left to be counted, and some key races remain undetermined. But in the Alaska Legislature, members of bipartisan coalitions in the House and Senate are wasting no time in announcing their leadership and organizing their caucuses.

Lawmakers announced Wednesday that the House would flip from Republican-led majority control. The speaker of the House will be Dillingham Independent Rep. Bryce Edgmon.

“There’s still a little bit of the dust-settling factor in play here, but we’re confident at this point we’ve got enough members to form a majority organization,” Edgmon said Thursday morning.

That means the Legislature as a whole will be more moderate than it has been for the past two years. Though Alaskans voted for Donald Trump this year by a wider margin than four years ago, the trend at the state level runs counter to the rightward shift seen across the country this cycle.

Edgmon said the majority has four key principles it’s organizing around: balanced budgets that don’t overdraw the Permanent Fund, stable funding for public education, reforming the state’s 401(k)-style retirement system and boosting energy development.

Two other leadership posts in the bipartisan coalition would go to moderate Republicans: Kodiak’s Louise Stutes would chair the Rules Committee, and Chuck Kopp of Anchorage would be majority leader.

Right now, Democrats, independents and the two Republicans announced as coalition leaders are ahead in 22 House races. They need 21 to secure control, but there are two Anchorage races where Democrats hold leads of under 100 votes.

Challenger Ted Eischeid leads incumbent Republican Stanley Wright in North Muldoon by 111 votes. And in Government Hill, parts of Northeast Anchorage and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, incumbent Democrat Cliff Groh has a razor-thin lead over Republican David Nelson. The difference in that race is a mere 28 votes.

With those two key races undetermined, House Republican leaders say it’s too soon to say anything definitive about who will hold power next year.

“I just think it may be just a little bit premature,” Wasilla Republican and House Majority Leader Cathy Tilton said by phone Wednesday evening shortly after the multiparty coalition claimed control of the House in a news release. “There’s a lot of votes still out there.”

Chuck Kopp said that as of Thursday afternoon, there are more than 22 members committed to joining the bipartisan caucus. That includes the Anchorage Democrats who hold slim leads and at least one more Republican, who Kopp declined to name.

Kopp said he expects more to join, and coalition leaders are leaving the door open.

“We’re intentionally keeping the invitation open for a good amount of time so that people can hopefully go back to their districts and talk to their leaders and the people they respect, and ask them, ‘How can I best represent you? Should I do it in the minority, or should I do it with a seat at the table in the majority?’” Kopp said Thursday afternoon.

Kopp said he expects the coalition to announce its full membership, including committee chairs, before Thanksgiving.

A bipartisan coalition will also continue to lead the Senate under very similar leadership to the past two years. Kodiak Republican Gary Stevens plans to stay on as Senate president.

“I think we want to address the elections issue as early as we can, and also the funding of education as early as we can,” Stevens said Thursday. “Those are the two big issues right now, but there’ll be a lot of others that come up when the Senate gets together later in December or January.”

The size of the Senate majority is up in the air. Two coalition Republicans from last session will not return to the Legislature, and it’s not clear if their replacements will join the bipartisan group. Wasilla Republican Robert Yundt, on track to defeat David Wilson, did not return messages, nor did Mike Cronk of Tok, who is slated to replace Click Bishop. Another incumbent coalition member, Fairbanks Democrat Scott Kawasaki, has a slight lead in a close race for reelection.

If five or more senators decline to join the coalition, they could form a minority caucus that would guarantee them seats on Senate committees.

A spokesperson for Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy, Grant Robinson, said in a statement that the governor looks forward to working with “anyone in the legislature who is focused on moving Alaska forward.”

But whether Dunleavy will be in the governor’s mansion is an open question. He has attended campaign events for Donald Trump and congratulated the president-elect late Tuesday night — that’s before the race was called. Four years ago, the Dunleavy administration joined a lawsuit attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in four swing states.

In an interview with Alaska’s News Source on Wednesday, Dunleavy left the door open to joining the Trump administration.

“I have not had the discussions with the President about jobs. I have not had discussions with his people about jobs,” Dunleavy said. “If those discussions come, I’d be certainly interested in hearing what the President is thinking, but that hasn’t happened yet.”

Spokesperson Jeff Turner said Dunleavy “remains fully committed to serving as Governor and moving Alaska forward.”

If Dunleavy does leave, he would be replaced by Republican Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom, a former corrections commissioner and state lawmaker who represented Eagle River.

Alaska Republican leaders said they’re elated by Tuesday’s election results and hopeful they will create more opportunity for oil drilling and other development on Alaska’s federal lands.

Not only did Donald Trump win back the White House, but Republicans regained control of the U.S. Senate. That means both Alaska senators are back in the majority, increasing their ability to advance their agenda in Congress.

U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan sees the wins as good for Alaska.

“Those are bipartisan issues that we want to get done here — the King Cove road, ANWR, NPR-A,” he said at an election night watch party. “I mean things that are very bipartisan in Alaska, the Biden administration sought to shut down, successfully.”

Alaska voters opted decisively for the Trump ticket. With nearly all precincts counted, 55% of Alaska voters picked Trump while 40% picked Kamala Harris.

Alaska Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy also celebrated Trump’s victory. In a livestream Wednesday morning, Dunleavy said the former president was good for the state during his first term, and the governor expects similar priorities in Trump’s second term.

“He sees Alaska’s oil resources, our gas resources, our mining resources, our timber resources, our location on the globe, our military, as assets, not just for Alaska, but as solutions to the country’s problems,” he said.

The Biden administration has until Jan. 20 to try to carry out its Alaska policies. Just Wednesday it issued a decision on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge that infuriates development advocates. The Interior Department decided to open just 400,000 acres to oil leasing, the minimum required by Congress. The first Trump administration had proposed to open an area three times as large.

U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski achieved major agenda wins under the Trump administration, including the law that requires oil leasing in the Arctic Refuge. But her relationship with Trump is rough. She voted to convict him after his second impeachment. Earlier this year she called him flawed “to his core” and indicated he lacks the character to be president. Trump has called Murkowski “disloyal” and in 2022 flew to Alaska to help promote a more conservative challenger.

Murkowski said they can still have a productive term.

“If that just means I need to approach things in a different way, I will do so,” she said during a news conference on Wednesday. “But at the end of the day, regardless of how a given president feels about me, personally or politically, my job, my role, is to make sure that Alaska stands to gain, and that’s what I intend to do.”

Murkowski said with the Senate Republican majority, she could become chair of the Indian Affairs Committee and also chair of the subcommittee that holds the purse strings of the Interior Department.

Bipartisan majorities will control both the Alaska House and Senate following the election, lawmakers said Wednesday evening.

That means the state House will flip from Republican-led majority control and have a new speaker, according to a news release. Independent Dillingham Rep. Bryce Edgmon will take the gavel.

Two other top leadership jobs will go to moderate Republicans, according to the release. Chuck Kopp, a moderate Anchorage Republican with a large lead over incumbent Republican Craig Johnson, will be the House’s majority leader, and Republican Louise Stutes of Kodiak will chair the powerful Rules Committee.

Stutes has been the only Republican in the predominantly Democratic and independent minority coalition for the last two years. Kopp was a member of a multiparty caucus during a previous stint in the Legislature.

The House coalition says it’ll prioritize stable education funding, budgets that do not overdraw the Permanent Fund, retirement reform and energy development.

“Alaskans have spoken clearly and we will work together, representing residents of all regions,” Edgmon said in the news release.

It’s not clear how many members the House majority will have, but the announcement invited “additional legislators supportive of these principles” to join.

Several House races remain unresolved as of Wednesday evening, and there are thousands of ballots around the state left to count. Wasilla Republican Cathy Tilton, the current House speaker, said that meant it was too soon to form a majority.

“I just think it may be just a little bit premature,” she said by phone. “There’s a lot of votes still out there.”

Members of both the House and Senate coalitions have frequently found themselves at odds with Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy.

The current leadership of the bipartisan Senate majority will remain in place, according to a news release from Senate leaders.

Kodiak Republican Gary Stevens will continue as Senate president. Anchorage Republican Cathy Giessel will be the majority leader. Anchorage Democrat Bill Wielechowski will continue as chair of the powerful Rules Committee.

“Alaskans can look forward to a productive Senate majority, getting the important things done. We are focused on doing our best for Alaska families, businesses, and communities,” Giessel said in a prepared statement.

Though the three current co-chairs of the Senate Finance Committee will remain at the helm, there is one notable change. Bethel Democrat Lyman Hoffman will chair the committee as it discusses the state’s operating budget, and Sitka Republican Bert Stedman will lead its approach to the capital budget. Hoffman is currently the capital budget co-chair, and Stedman is the operating budget co-chair.

Golovin Democrat Donny Olson will stay on as the Finance Committee co-chair responsible for other bills that come to the committee.

Eagle River Republican Kelly Merrick will be Senate’s majority whip, and Anchorage Democrat Elvi Gray-Jackson will chair the Legislative Budget and Audit Committee.

Wielechowski said in a prepared statement that the bipartisan caucus would work to strengthen the state’s workforce, improve public schools and invest in infrastructure.

“By removing partisan differences, we’re focused on what truly matters to Alaskans with solutions that support strong communities and lasting economic growth,” he said. “This is about making tangible improvements that benefit all corners of our state – urban and rural.”

The existing Senate majority includes 17 of the body’s 20 members, but at least two will not return to the Legislature. Republican Click Bishop of Fairbanks did not seek reelection, and Wasilla Republican David Wilson is on track to lose his bid for another term.

Their probable replacements are Republican Mike Cronk, who leads in the race to replace Bishop, and Robert Yundt, who is leading Wilson. They did not immediately respond to messages. Yundt has been critical of the current majority, in recent days citing on social media the caucus’s failure to pass legislation barring transgender girls from school sports.

Another majority-caucus member, Fairbanks Democratic Sen. Scott Kawasaki is in a tight race with Republican challenger Leslie Hajdukovich with many ballots left to be counted.

Final unofficial election results, including ranked choice tabulations, are expected Nov. 20. State election officials plan to certify the election Nov. 30.

Find more election coverage at ktoo.org/elections.