Two Democrats and two Republicans are leading in early primary election results in the race for governor.
The top four candidates in the nonpartisan blanket primary will advance to the general election in November. For now, those are:
- Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins with 21.7%
- Democrat Tom Begich with 20.0%
- Republican Bernadette Wilson with 10.5%
- Republican Dave Bronson with 8.4%
Close behind, but outside the top four, are:
- Republican Treg Taylor with 7.5%
- Republican Click Bishop with 7.1%
- Republican Adam Crum with 5.7%
- Republican Shelley Hughes with 5.6%
- Independent Bill Walker with 4.4%
Some 93% of precincts have reported results so far. Votes are still being counted, and the results could change in subsequent updates.
The field
Kreiss-Tomkins, often referred to by his initials, JKT, welcomed the results at a gathering in Anchorage Tuesday evening. Democrats' strong showing in the primary reflects an electorate fed up with the incumbent Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy, he said.
"Voters want a change," he said. "We're excited about our numbers and that people want new energy and new leadership, and we want to provide that."
Kreiss-Tomkins represented Sitka and rural Southeast Alaska in the Legislature for a decade. Though he and fellow Democrat Begich share many policy priorities, Kriess-Tomkins has argued his history of winning elections in a district that voted for Donald Trump makes him the more electable candidate.
He's the top fundraiser in the race at more than $2 million, but he's faced criticism for taking hundreds of thousands of campaign dollars from out-of-state donors in the tech industry, including several employees of the artificial intelligence company Anthropic. Kreiss-Tomkins has proposed a moratorium on new data centers in the state and has said his big donors share his concerns over the societal impacts of powerful AI systems.
Begich, a former Downtown Anchorage state senator, was the first Democrat to enter the race. He's campaigning on raising oil and gas revenue in an effort to get Alaska what he calls a "fair share" of its resource wealth. He said he'd also like to boost state funding for education and work across the aisle.
As returns came in Tuesday night, Begich said the fact that two Democrats were atop the field was an encouraging sign.
"We'd bought into the myth, a little bit, that Democrats don't always win here. But that said, we now know that that is just what I said: a myth," Begich said. "What we're seeing instead is Alaskans ready for change, and that's exciting to me."
Though the Alaska Beacon reported that the top two Democrats have quietly discussed whether the second-place candidate should drop out in an effort to consolidate the vote, Begich said Tuesday night he wasn't ready to do so just yet.
"That's a calculation I want to do once we know all the votes," he said.
Begich's father and brother both served in Congress as Democrats; his nephew Nick Begich III is a sitting Republican congressman. Most of his fundraising has come from in-state, though roughly half of his more than $1 million has come from two large donors.
Wilson, a conservative activist, garbage-hauling business owner and first-time candidate, has made paying large Permanent Fund dividends the centerpiece of her campaign. Though the state's annual withdrawal from the Permanent Fund is capped by state law at 5% of the fund's value, Wilson has argued "the money is there" and that lawmakers should pay dividends in line with a formula in state law.
Wilson has said the state should take an approach similar to Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, in reducing state spending, though she's said she's not sure how much such an effort would save. Wilson has leaned hard on grassroots fundraising, raking in small-dollar donations from Republicans across the country. She has said she'll drop out of the race if she's not the top Republican vote-getter and urged other candidates to do the same.
Wilson did not allow Alaska Public Media to enter her election results watch party in Midtown Anchorage Tuesday evening, and her campaign declined an interview request.
Bronson was mayor of Anchorage from 2021 to 2024, losing his reelection bid to independent Suzanne LaFrance.
Bronson has leaned on his experience as Anchorage's chief executive and said his "difficult" term as mayor, marked by scandals and clashes with the Anchorage Assembly, taught him lessons that leave him better prepared than other candidates for the state's top job. Bronson has said the progressive-majority Assembly was "crazy" and that he'd look forward to working across the aisle with a closely divided Legislature if elected as governor.
"People are tired of all the fighting and bickering in Juneau," he said in a phone interview Tuesday night. "They want to get things done."
He's also made fisheries central to his pitch, calling to limit factory trawling over concerns about incidentally caught halibut, salmon and other valuable fish. Bronson has also said he would push for large Permanent Fund dividends, though he's acknowledged that it would be practically impossible to provide dividends in line with a formula in state law without a significant increase in state revenue. The last formula-driven dividend was paid in 2015.
Bronson said he planned to continue his campaign through the general election in November.
"We're gonna continue forward for the next two and a half months based on the numbers that we've got," he said. "There's always, you know, opportunities to change decisions, but right now, I have every intention of moving forward."
Vote-counting is still underway, and some votes have yet to arrive at state election offices. Absentee ballots must be postmarked by Tuesday but can arrive until August 28. The Division of Elections says it plans to certify the results August 31.
Alaska Public Media's Wesley Early, James Daggett and Matt Faubion contributed reporting.
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