Alaska is known as a Republican stronghold, but that might be changing.
The 2020 election wasn’t a blowout, at least by red state standards. Trump beat Biden by 52.83% to 42.77%, or 189,951 to 153,778 votes. And the state’s politics remain hard to clearly define. Activists and Democratic leaders point to Alaska’s progressive achievements in certain areas and say they see the potential for making electoral gains with stronger organizing and the right messaging.
The challenge
Opportunity doesn’t equal easy. Alaska has a long history of supporting the GOP, voting for a Republican in every presidential election since Nixon in 1968 and sending a fully Republican congressional delegation to Washington since 1981, with one Senate term for Democrat Mark Begich as the exception.
Party registration tilts heavily Republican. 140,287 voters are registered with the GOP while only 77,126 are Democrats. 16,770 voters affiliated themselves with the right-wing Alaskan Independence Party.
The state’s demographics aren’t promising, either, although Alaska isn’t as white as some red states. Of the 731,545 population, 60% are non-Hispanic white, 15.6% are Native American or Alaskan, 7.3% are Hispanic or Latino, 6.5% are of Asian descent, and 3.7% are Black.
It’s not friendly territory for the Democratic Party. But the state is hard to pin down, given a complicated politics that make Alaska hard to define.
Republicans hold the state Senate, but not the House—that’s Democrat majority thanks to two GOP members and four Independents who caucus with the Democrats. In return, the speaker, Louise Stutes, is a Republican.
Residents get annual payouts from the Alaska Permanent Fund, money generated by state oil revenues. Nearly a quarter of the size of the entire contiguous U.S., more than half of Alaska’s land is federally held. The government has a role to play.
Public health in particular stands out—the state was the first in the nation to expand vaccine eligibility to all adults.
“Alaska has the highest-quality Indigenous health, has the highest population of vaccinated people, and that’s why we were the first state to open up vaccinations,” Democratic state Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins said.
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Alaska voting
What party leaders say
Alaska has a lot going for it, said Kreiss-Tomkins. There’s a strong labor movement, enthusiasm around conservation and a diverse electorate that isn’t easily pigeonholed.
“Alaska’s had the greatest shift of any state in the union over the last 20 years over the presidential results, which blows most people’s minds,” said Kreiss-Tomkins. “It should be more well known, and the only reason it hasn’t captured the progressive attention span is that the starting point was, it was one of the three or four most Republican states in the country. And this time, Biden lost Alaska by almost single digits.”
Going from a 30+ point advantage to just over 10 points is a change, but not a huge one. Yet Kreiss-Tomkins believes it shows the potential for Alaska to flip to purple like Colorado before it and become a swing state.
On the state level, Democrats are holding the state House and are in a solid place after decades of ups and downs, said Kreiss-Tomkins.
“Under the current leadership, we’re in a good place,” Kreiss-Tomkins said.
What activists say
For all that, Democrats have a hard time getting their message out. In comments that echoed feedback Blue Tent heard from organizers and party leaders in other red states, organizer Derek Reed noted that the state party tends only to engage with voters when it’s election time. That’s a strategy that’s just not sustainable.
“People do feel like the party only comes around when it’s time to ask for a vote,” Reed said. “People want to see if there’s someone fighting for them and their best interests—even when it’s not election season. People want a phone call to talk about the issues more than they want a phone call begging for money.”
Talking to people about who’s thinking about their interests is the only way forward, Reed said. It’s about credibility, too—the state’s Republican governor, Mike Dunleavy, came into office in 2018 on the back of a populist message. But since taking charge of the state, he’s been anything but a friend to the working class.
It’s in listening to those people that Alaska Democrats can find the way forward and know what issues to make a priority—and build a coalition.
“If Democrats want to succeed, they need to talk to people and listen to people, listen to what they’re going through,” said Reed. “The issues that affect the working class directly affect women’s issues, Indigenous issues, people of color, because most of those working-class jobs are worked by women, people of color, Indigenous people, etc.”
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Alaska demographics
The path to victory
Democrats in Alaska have a lot of challenges ahead to flip the state. Entrenched Republican lawmakers in the state legislature and a federal slate that doesn’t seem near changing are discouraging.
It takes steps to get there. But there’s energy—young people are more involved today in the political process and combining their efforts with more established leaders.
“We’re seeing a really big increase of young people getting involved with the party infrastructure, and that shows some of the strength that the party is gaining, because we have seasoned veterans of the party who have been around for 40, 50 years doing this work, and you’ve got people who are coming in that [have] been doing it maybe five years, or they’re brand new to organizing,” said Reed. “I think the party is in a really great position.
The first task is taking down Dunleavy, up for re-election next year. Reed, though he celebrates the work that’s already been done around the state for organizers and by Democrats, said that progressives need to keep their eye on the ball.
“It’s going to take a lot of work to continue to build on the successes,” said Reed.
Realism is important.
“We will not be competitive in 2024,” Kreiss-Tomkins said. “I think it will almost certainly be a single-digit margin, but unless it’s like a tidal wave like [a] Ronald Reagan, 1984-style election, Alaska will not be pulled blue by the back half of this coming decade.”
