Ranked-choice voting could prolong Alaska’s ballot count
Mary Peltola is carrying her campaign for the US Senate seat held by two-term Republican Dan Sullivan into Alaska’s interior, including places inaccessible by road. She hopes the cost-of-living crisis will make her the first Democrat to win the seat in nearly two decades. Voters are scheduled to cast ballots on 3 November, and state Democrats regard the Sullivan contest as a top prize among the state’s competitive midterm races. A photograph credited to Kerry Tasker/Reuters shows Peltola launching her Senate campaign in Anchorage on 17 January 2026.
On the campaign trail, Peltola has been to towns where paper towels retail for $40, a half-gallon of oat milk costs $21 and a new freezer can cost quadruple what it costs in Anchorage, the state’s largest city, because delivery is complicated. Along the Arctic Ocean, she has heard of communities where power bills have climbed to $1,500 a month because they rely on generators, while the Iran war has pushed the cost of diesel to new heights. “Nobody can afford that,” Peltola said in an interview.
Alaska is a right-leaning state about twice the size of Texas and the third least-populous in the country. It has long been among the more expensive places to live, though price increases in rural areas have not necessarily been felt to the same degree in the more populous cities and towns. Alaska Democrats believe circumstances have aligned for them to win a slew of competitive elections in the 3 November midterms, and the Sullivan seat is a top prize.
At a press conference last week, Eric Croft, chair of the state Democratic party, said: “In 23 short days, we’re going to be voting both [Republican congressman] Nick Begich and Dan Sullivan out of office, and they richly deserve it.” Croft added: “They are self-serving, self-dealing DC politicians who repeatedly voted to make life harder and more expensive for Alaskans.”
Candidates diverge on energy and development
On the campaign trail, Peltola and Sullivan have argued over who would do a better job lowering costs for Alaskans and representing the state’s fishing and oil and gas industries in the US Capitol. Both have accused the other of answering to special interests in the Lower 48 rather than Alaska, known as “the last frontier,” while Sullivan has accused Peltola of denigrating Alaskans after a report that she mistreated her staffers.
Peltola is an Alaska native and former US House lawmaker who supports oil and gas and gun rights. Sullivan, first elected in 2014 after ousting a Democratic incumbent, serves alongside Republican Lisa Murkowski, Alaska’s senior senator and one of the most outspoken Trump critics in the Senate. Murkowski has nonetheless remained a firm ally of the president even as her popularity has waned, unlike many vulnerable Republicans who sought distance. Sullivan has emphasized advocacy for Alaska’s military installations and the state’s proposed oil developments and major infrastructure projects, which he argues will come to fruition only if Republicans remain in charge.
Peltola opposes Trump’s tariffs, saying they have driven up costs for imports from Canada, which separates Alaska from the rest of the country. She has also condemned his decision to attack Iran and the conflict it sparked, which has driven gasoline and diesel costs even higher than usual. Gasoline and diesel typically arrive by barge or ship in Alaska’s interior and island communities. During a visit to a picket line of flight attendants at Anchorage’s main airport, Peltola said: “These really frivolous decisions are just putting Alaskans in a bind, and we’re really paying the price for these weird partisan wars.” With a laugh, she added: “I don’t know what’s funny about that, but it’s funny.”
Alaska is one of the nation’s top oil-producing states. Its Permanent Fund pays each resident a dividend that is usually upwards of $1,000 each year, while production, concentrated on the North Slope, has steadily declined since peaking in the late 1980s. Managing the resource is a constant topic in state politics. A photograph credited to Lance King/Getty Images shows a caribou on the tundra near the Trans Alaska pipeline system near Atigun Pass in Alaska on 9 May 2025.
Sullivan supports Trump’s moves to open more protected federal land and waters to drilling, which could offer new revenue opportunities. He welcomed President Donald Trump’s announcement that South Korea would invest $54bn to build a long-discussed natural gas pipeline across the state, although later reports said Seoul had agreed to no such deal.
Although Peltola was in the House for just over two years, she has taken credit for pushing Joe Biden to approve the massive Willow oil project over environmentalists’ objections. She also emphasizes the opportunities renewable energy could present for Alaska’s communities and is cognizant that her party prioritizes fighting the climate crisis, which many believe requires curbing oil and gas production. Peltola said: “We do need more oil production in our state for our state revenues to pay for our schools, our roads, our public safety.” The sky-high prices for gas in parts of Alaska were proof to Peltola that oil was not the solution alone. “When you’re paying $26 a gallon for gas or diesel, we’re priced out of petroleum,” she said.
Outside spending and Trump’s campaign trip
A photograph credited to Kerry Tasker/Reuters shows Republican US senator Dan Sullivan after a debate with Mary Peltola in Anchorage on 15 October 2026. All signs indicate that Republicans are taking the threat posed by Peltola seriously. Outside groups have poured tens of millions of dollars into supporting both candidates, and last week Donald Trump made the long journey from Washington, DC, to the conservative Matanuska-Susitna valley to rally voters behind Sullivan, who has trailed in some recent polls.
At a packed sports center in Wasilla, Trump said: “Here in Alaska, the Democrats are running radical left Mary Peltola for the Senate. If she gets in, you’re screwed.” Wasilla is best known outside the state as the hometown of Sarah Palin, the Republican former vice-presidential nominee.
Ballot mechanics and state politics
Sullivan faces a separate vulnerability in the form of a similarly named Republican challenger who made it through Alaska’s top-four primary and could split his support. Polls open on 3 November, but the outcome may not be known for days. Alaska has always taken a long time to count its ballots, and ranked-choice voting in the Senate contest could make the wait for a final result even longer.
Alaska’s politics are nuanced despite its right-leaning reputation. Since becoming the 49th state in 1959, Alaska has supported a Democratic presidential candidate only once, Lyndon B Johnson in 1964. Bipartisan majorities currently control the legislature, and a Democrat is the frontrunner in the governor’s race. In the state’s lone US House race, Democrats have coalesced behind independent candidate Bill Hill, who is taking on Begich and receiving support from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Hill said in an interview: “Sixty per cent of Alaskans do not identify with the Republican or the Democratic party. We are a great example in this state of how government should work.”
Candidate records and staff allegations
A former state lawmaker, Peltola rose to prominence in 2022 when she won a special election to replace Don Young, the long-serving Republican congressman who died at 88, becoming the first Alaska native in Congress. She was elected to a full term later that year, then lost re-election to Begich in 2024. Democrats view her as the best candidate they could field against Sullivan. A photograph credited to Michael Siluk/Universal Images Group/Getty Images shows a fish hatchery in Valdez on 23 August 2023. Her campaign centers on the slogan “fish, family, freedom,” and she has added an Alaskan focus to the cost-focused platform many Democrats have adopted nationwide. Visitors to the campaign website can play a video game intended to highlight her views on bycatch, or the accidental netting of other species by trawlers. Bycatch has become a major controversy in Alaska as salmon runs have dwindled.
In September, The New York Times reported allegations that Peltola had verbally and physically abused her staff and used slurs. Sullivan told supporters in Wasilla: “My opponent really doesn’t like her fellow Alaskans. She just doesn’t.” Peltola’s campaign said parts of the report were not true and noted that some of the behavior occurred while she was grieving the death of her husband in a plane crash and the death of her mother around the same time. When asked about the report during a debate with Sullivan last week, Peltola said: “I do not think that this election is about me on my worst day, and I found so many of these allegations concerning and outright fabrications.”
A photograph credited to Hasan Akbas/Anadolu/Getty Images shows demonstrators marching during the No Kings protest in downtown Anchorage on 28 March 2026. At a rally with Trump, Sullivan said: “Joe Biden, Schumer, their Democratic allies came after Alaska with a barrage of executive orders to shut down our state, kill jobs, drive up the cost of energy, and my opponent, Mary Peltola, not only did nothing to stop it, she enabled it.” He continued: “They try to kill our jobs and turn us into a national park. Ladies and gentlemen, the conflict in the Middle East is temporary. The true forever war is the national Democrats’ war against Alaska oil and gas and our jobs.”
Across the campaign, Peltola has emphasized tariffs, the Iran conflict, fuel prices and rural delivery costs, while Sullivan has emphasized expanded drilling, military installations and major projects. Voting opens on 3 November, but Alaska’s history of long ballot counts and its ranked-choice Senate system could leave the final result unknown for days.