Federal Government

People who might have been exposed to radiation from atomic weapons tests conducted in the Aleutians half a century ago have extra time to apply for compensation from a federal program, under the sweeping tax and budget bill passed by Congress and signed into law last week.

The bill, which was signed by President Donald Trump on July 4, includes a provision reviving the Radiation Compensation Exposure Act, which was enacted in 1990.

The act’s compensation system distributed one-time payments to people who were exposed to radiation from the weapons tests and who later were diagnosed with certain types of cancer. The program has distributed about $2.7 billion to date, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

While most of the tests covered by the act were conducted in Nevada, the program also covers health damages from underground weapons tests conducted on Alaska’s Amchitka Island in 1965, 1969 and 1971.

The program covers former uranium mine workers, as well, many of whom were Navajo Nation members.

The compensation program had been on track to expire, with a previous deadline of June 10, 2024, for any new claims.

The budget bill extends the deadline for new claims to Dec. 31, 2027, and it sets a Dec. 31, 2028, sunset date for the trust fund that administers the claims.

The bill also raises compensation amounts. For “downwinders,” people who were not on site at the time of the tests but may have been exposed to radiation carried by the wind, the compensation is hiked from $50,000 to $100,000. For on-site workers, the compensation is raised from $75,000 to $100,000.

Of the Alaska weapons tests, the third — called Cannikin — was the most controversial.

It was the biggest underground nuclear test ever conducted by the United States. The tested bomb was 5 megatons, about 250 times as powerful as the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945. There was widespread opposition to the project, including from environmentalists who later founded the organization Greenpeace.

Legal opposition to the test went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ultimately allowed the project to proceed.

The test created what was the equivalent of a magnitude 7 earthquake, killing up to 2,000 sea otters and thousands of fish.

The island continues to undergo environmental monitoring, for which the U.S. Department of Energy is responsible. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation and the Aleutian Pribilof Islands Association, a tribal organization, are partners.

Alaska’s lone member of the U.S. House of Representatives said Thursday that he had “no doubt” that he was going to vote for the Republican-drafted budget bill that passed the House on a 218-214 vote Thursday.

In a phone call after the vote Rep. Nick Begich III, R-Alaska, said he was pleased that it provides additional opportunities for oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, and Cook Inlet.

“I think the bill has some incredible provisions for Alaska. We have been trying for decades to unlock the energy potential of our state, and this bill does that,” Begich said. “There’s 30 million acres mandated as a minimum lease sale amount in ANWR, NPR-A and the Cook Inlet that gives us the oil and gas that we need to refill our our state coffers, ensure that the Permanent Fund is well funded into the future, that we can continue to pay PFDs well into the future.”

Begich had proposed that 90% of federal revenue from federal leases in those areas be returned to the state. The final version of the bill will send 70%, starting in 2034.

Current state law distributes money from the existing 50-50 split to the state general fund, primarily for use in North Slope communities. The new split increases the amount of money available for those uses.

In an interview with reporters on Wednesday, Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, said he believes no state fared better than Alaska in the negotiations around the bill.

“I think it is true when you look at just the pure acreage (available for oil leasing). Just on this one provision alone, Alaska stands to gain tremendously,” Begich said.

Most criticism of the bill has focused on its effects on Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, better known as food stamps.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a progressive think tank opposed to the bill, estimated that 35,000 Alaskans would lose health insurance if the bill becomes law, both from Medicaid cuts and from scaled-back tax credits used to pay for individual policies.

In a town hall meeting Wednesday night, State Rep. Genevieve Mina, D-Anchorage, said she estimates the bill will add $100 million to $200 million in Medicaid costs to the state, and SNAP changes will require the state to pay up to $50 million per year within a few years.

The bill increases the size of a rural hospital fund, which will send $200 million to $300 million to Alaska, Sens. Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said on Tuesday.

“There’s a lot of uncertainty with a new program,” Mina said, “whereas Medicaid has reliably funded our rural areas and supported our communities and has been a fabric of our health care economy for so long.”

She also pointed out that the bill creates a work requirement for Medicaid.

“Given the fact that we already know so many Alaskans who are behind on their SNAP and Medicaid benefits for months, this is going to add more paperwork and bureaucracy for our state, but then also for people on the ground, they’re going to be kicked off of Medicaid because of additional paperwork, even though folks are working,” she said.

Asked whether he thinks Alaska will be entirely shielded from the effects of those cuts, Begich implied that the answer is no, but he believes “we have significant runway that’s been provided for Alaska” via various sections of the bill.

“Traditional recipients of Medicaid will continue to receive the same benefits that they deserve to receive. There are no changes to the traditional Medicaid system,” Begich said.

When it comes to the work requirement, there are “exclusions for folks who are caregivers to family members, for folks who are looking for work but haven’t found it yet, for folks who are in counties or boroughs with more than one and a half times the national average unemployment rate. It has exclusions for people who volunteer 20 hours a week.”

“If someone is able to work or contribute in some way, even volunteer, they should do that. And I think that’s a smart provision. It’s a provision that’s really targeted, and it’s been designed just for that sub-population of folks who could be helping and are not currently doing so,” he said.

During his campaign for U.S. House in 2024, Begich told the Fairbanks Chamber of Commerce that Alaskans should expect him to seek less federal spending because he is concerned about the size of the national debt.

The Congressional Budget Office expects the new budget bill to increase the federal debt by more than $3.4 trillion over the next 10 years.

“Well, I think I would dispute that,” Begich said, explaining that he believes the CBO is underestimating economic growth that will take place because of the tax cuts within the bill.

“We’re on the cusp of an AI revolution, a robotics revolution, tremendous gains are on the horizon for labor productivity. We’re seeing the labor market remain strong. … I think the challenge with the CBO and some of the other models is that they’re scoring the assumptive growth rate exceptionally low.”

The 2017 federal tax cuts being extended by the new bill have thus far failed to create growth necessary to balance the deficits they created.

Begich said he’s been a strong supporter of the budget bill since even before it was proposed at the start of the new Congress.

“There was no doubt I was going to vote for this bill,” he said. “I started working on this bill before I was even sworn into Congress. I approached leadership when it looked like we were going to win this seat. And I told them, budget reconciliation is around the corner.”

Begich said that House leaders tried to reassure him that ANWR drilling provisions would be in the bill, but he advocated more drilling, in NPR-A and Cook Inlet, and additional provisions to support mining and logging.

“So when this bill came back from the Senate, I was enthusiastically supporting it, and I told others in the House that this is an important priority for us, certainly, but it’s really important for the rest of the nation,” Begich said.

Shortly after the U.S. House passed the Republican megabill, continuing tax breaks and cutting Medicaid, about two dozen protesters gathered on the street outside the Anchorage offices of Alaska’s congressional delegation.

Kim Anderson said she was devastated, especial by Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s vote.

“I flew all the way to D.C. I talked to Murkowski personally,” said Anderson, a caregiver who has relied on Medicaid for the therapy needs of the former foster children she adopted. “She said she understood, that she was going to fight for us.”

Alaska is in a special position in the budget reconciliation bill that cleared Congress Thursday without a vote to spare. Murkowski was the pivotal vote in the Senate, and she voted for it only after extracting special concessions for her state. But the bill is predicted to leave nearly 12 million Americans without health insurance, and many Alaskans don’t like the bargain Murkowski struck.

Congressman Nick Begich called the bill “a transformative victory” for Alaska. He issued a statement lauding the bill’s mandate to offer millions of federal acres in the Arctic and Cook Inlet for oil and gas lease sales.

Sen. Dan Sullivan also spoke of it as an Alaska success, with, among other things, substantial funding for the Coast Guard and 16 icebreakers.

“I think it’s safe to say that no state fared better from this bill than our state,” he told Alaska reporters.

The bill is a top priority for President Donald Trump, too. Among its approximately 1,000 pages are large sums for defense and border security as well as tax breaks and spending cuts that disproportionally benefit wealthier households.

Murkowski is the only one of Alaska’s congressional delegation who expressed substantial uncertainty about the bill. She said she made a bad bill better for Alaska

“I tried to take care of Alaska’s interests,” she said after the Senate vote Tuesday. “But I know … that in many parts of the country there are Americans that are not going to be advantaged by this bill. I don’t like that.”

State Rep. Genevieve Mina, an Anchorage Democrat who chairs the House Health and Social Services Committee, said it’s a national misconception that the concessions Murkowski won make the bill a net-positive for Alaska.

“There’s a lot of talk about how there’s Alaska carveouts or a Kodiak kickback or a polar bear provision. These were not good deals for the state either,” she said. “They’re provisions that would risk so much to the rest of the nation.”

Nationally, the bill would reduce Medicaid spending by more than $1 trillion over a decade. It would also shift some of the cost of food assistance to the states. Murkowski got a two-year delay in some of that burden-shifting.

Mina said she didn’t think that would solve Alaska’s longstanding challenges processing Medicaid and food assistance applications. The bill will require the state to take on even more administrative work by verifying eligibility more often and tracking that beneficiaries meet new work requirements or have waivers.

Maybe the biggest win Murkowski got was boosting a fund for rural health care to $50 billion.

” I don’t want to sound ungrateful, because that’s better than the alternative,” said Jared Kosin, president of the Alaska Hospital and Health Care Association.

It’s impossible to know how much of that $50 billion Alaska will get, Kosin said, after studying the bill’s requirements.

“The State of Alaska is going to have to have an application approved by the federal government by Dec. 31 of this year, and it’s got to be a ‘detailed rural health transformation plan,'” Kosin said.

Then, hospitals and clinics would apply to the state, not knowing how much they’ll get.

Meanwhile, Kosin said, thousands of Alaskans are going to lose Medicaid coverage and will be forced to use hospital emergency rooms — either for primary care at essentially the highest cost to Alaskans as a whole, or because they are in crisis for lack of primary care.

“They’re going to show up in our facilities, and we’re going to do our best to take care of them,” he said. “But at the end of the day, that is a terrible model of health care in our state and any other state, regardless of how much money is flowing in.”

Rev. Elizabeth Schultz, who works for the regional Presbyterian organization, was among thousands of Alaskans who urged Murkowski to reject the bill.

She felt “deep disappointment and anger” when Murkowski helped the Senate pass it.

Schultz said she does not doubt that many groups in Alaska will benefit from the tax breaks and the special carveouts Murkowski won.

“And I don’t disparage that, but I’m not sure it was worth what it will mean for the rest of the country,” she said. “And I think when you’re in a position of that much power that she had at that moment, she could have used it for the benefit of the country.”

Other Alaskans are singing Murkowski’s praises. Ann Brown, former chair of the Alaska Republican Party, wrote an op-ed for the Anchorage Daily News saying Murkowski was an artful negotiator.

“Alaska owes her gratitude for delivering a good deal,” Brown wrote. “Those complaining in other states should start delivering for their own voters.”

Murkowski’s willingness to defy Trump has often alienated her from the Alaska Republican Party. Now it’s another bloc she’s relied on for support — the middle and left — who feel betrayed. Hundreds of angry Alaskans have posted on social media, vowing to never vote for Murkowski again.

The U.S. Department of Education is withholding about $6.8 billion in education funding for programs serving students in programs that range from migrant education to English language instruction and gifted education.

A Tuesday estimate from the Senate Congressional Appropriations Committee says that breaks down to more than $47.6 million withheld from Alaska.

Lon Garrison is the executive director of the Association of Alaska School Boards. He said that’s about 15% of federal funding the state receives for education. Garrison said the funding loss builds on an overall lack in education funding in Alaska.

“It continues to compound itself,” he said. “We’re losing federal funds to help do the things that we want to get done, and then the state itself is not funding education adequately, so we continue to be kind of hit from all sides, where the funding keeps getting rolled back for public education.”

Republican U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan says he’s pitching the Alaska LNG Project to the U.S. Department of Defense for potential investment. Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Sullivan said bringing the federal government on to the project could “dramatically lower the cost of capital.”

“One of the things that we are doing right now with Glenfarne and the Department of Defense is trying to see if there’s a way in which the Department of Defense can be a buyer of gas that would come down through the pipeline,” he said.

Glenfarne is the private company that assumed majority ownership of the project earlier this year. A company spokesperson declined to say whether the company is pitching the project to the Pentagon.

If it’s built, the Alaska LNG Project would move natural gas from the North Slope to Southcentral for export. The long-sought project is estimated to cost $44 billion. President Donald Trump has shown interest, boosting hopes that it might finally attract investors.

The proposed pipeline route passes near Alaska’s largest military bases – Fort Wainwright and Eielson Air Force Base in Fairbanks and Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage.

A spokesperson for the Alaska Gasline Development Corporation, which owns the state’s 25% project stake, says the Fairbanks military bases could connect to the pipeline through a proposed project spur. JBER is already connected to the ENSTAR Natural Gas system, to which the project would be connected.

Sullivan says he’s already pitched the project to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and to Hegseth’s deputy, Steve Feinberg.

“The senior leaders of the Pentagon are very aware of this opportunity and that Glenfarne is quite interested in that,” Sullivan said.

And he says the project could benefit from the budget reconciliation bill moving through Congress.

Among other things, the bill would replace an existing federal loan program with a new one – the Energy Dominance Financing program. Sullivan says the bill puts about $1 billion toward it.

“I was on a conference call with Secretary Wright, and, you know, that’s the capitalization in the program,” he said. “He is very interested in looking at the AK LNG Project as one of the projects by which they would use this new energy dominance financing mechanism.”

Glenfarne, the Alaska Gasline Development Corporation and Gov. Mike Dunleavy have previously said they’ll seek financing from the private sector.

“Because of the amount of private sector capital, you really don’t need to rely on government capital, and that’s been made clear countless times,” Dunleavy told KDLL last month.

The project has existing federal loan guarantees approved under former President Joe Biden. Sullivan says the program was never set up under Biden, but that he’s renewing that push under Trump.

Thirty-five men who were detained by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement in the Lower 48 and held for weeks in an Anchorage jail have now been transferred out of state, officials say.

Last month, the state Department of Corrections announced that it had taken in 40 men who were arrested and detained in the Lower 48, and housed them at the Anchorage Correctional Complex, under a deal with the federal government. The move triggered backlash, as immigration attorneys raised concerns about conditions in the Anchorage jail.

In a statement Monday, DOC spokeswoman Betsy Holley said the remaining 35 men held in the state were recently transferred back into the custody of the federal Department of Homeland Security. She declined to say where the men were transferred to, citing security reasons.

“Alaska DOC is a holding facility for the federal government,” Holley said in an email. “It was never intended that the detainees would be in Alaska for long-term.”

Announcement of the transfer came two days after the American Civil Liberties Union of Alaska sent a letter to state Attorney General Treg Taylor, demanding that the state not hold ICE detainees at the Anchorage Correctional Complex for more than 72 hours until conditions improved at the facility. In June, ACLU attorneys testified at a state House Judiciary Committee hearing that detainees were being held in “punitive conditions,” which they claimed violated ICE standards. At the same hearing, state DOC Commissioner Jen Winkelman acknowledged several “bumps in the road” in the detention process.

ACLU spokeswoman Meghan Barker said in an email that attorneys with her organization were alerted to the transfer after they tried to confirm pre-scheduled meetings with some of the detainees.

“We’re unsure where they were sent and if safe and humane transport was provided, which was one of the demands we made in our letter,” Barker wrote.

Holley said there is currently one man in custody in the state who’d been detained by ICE officials in Alaska. She said he was arrested before the group of 40 detainees were flown to Anchorage.

Regional ICE spokespeople did not immediately respond to questions Tuesday regarding the transfer, including where the men were sent and why they were transferred to Alaska in the first place. In at least one instance, a man arrested by ICE officials in Anchorage was transferred out of state to an immigration facility in Tacoma, Washington.