Last-day shakeup in Alaska’s race for governor puts disqualified candidate’s wife on the ballot

Alaska’s November election for governor will include one Democrat and three Republicans after a final-days shakeup that included a wild last-hour substitution on Monday, the deadline to make changes after August’s primary election. 

Under Alaska’s unique elections system, all candidates for an office run against each other in the primary election. The top four candidates, regardless of political party, advance to the general election in November. 

Former state Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, a Democrat from Sitka, finished August’s primary election with 22.5% of the vote, the most out of 16 candidates seeking to replace incumbent Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy.

The second-place finisher, Democratic candidate Tom Begich, withdrew from the race officially on Monday despite earning 20.8% of the vote. 

That promoted Anchorage businesswoman Bernadette Wilson, a Republican, to the second spot on the November ballot. Wilson had 10.1% of the vote in the primary.

Begich’s withdrawal put former Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson, a Republican, into the third spot for November. Bronson earned 8.1% of the primary vote. 

The withdrawal would also have promoted Republican candidate and former Attorney General Treg Taylor into the fourth spot, but on Monday, Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom disqualified Taylor because of gaps in a legally required financial report.

That left Taylor’s lieutenant governor candidate, Republican businesswoman Candice English, to decide by 5 p.m. whether to withdraw or continue with another running mate. 

English found one — Taylor’s wife, Jodi Taylor, who became English’s lieutenant governor candidate in a form filed less than an hour before the 5 p.m. deadline.

According to the Anchorage Press, which was on the scene in Anchorage, English told election workers, “I’m stepping up to governor.” She also told another visitor to the office: “It’s all for the good of the state. The state needs the right people in place. We can’t get it wrong.”

It was not immediately clear on Monday evening whether the substitution is legal. Jodi Taylor’s required personal financial disclosure form contains the same information as Treg Taylor’s, and state regulators found it inadequate.

State law gives Jodi Taylor 30 days to amend her report before a final determination on her candidacy. 

In Alaska’s November general election, voters will rank the four candidates (and any write-in candidates) in order of preference.

When ballots are counted, the candidate with the fewest top rankings is eliminated, and any votes for them are redistributed to their voters’ second choices.

The process continues until only two candidates are left, and the person with the most votes wins.

Ranked choice voting reduces the chances that candidates from the same party will split available voters and improve the odds for a candidate from a different party, but the system does not eliminate that chance entirely.

Since 2022, when Alaska began using the current system, a significant number of voters have continued to rank just one candidate.

As a result, political parties have pressured lower-finishing primary candidates to withdraw ahead of the general election in order to consolidate support. 

In the case of Alaska’s governor race, where governor and lieutenant governor run as a single ticket, that led to talks around consolidation, where a lower-finishing governor candidate takes the place of a lieutenant governor on a higher-finishing ticket.

That didn’t happen on the Republican side, but it did on the Democratic one.

Second-place finisher Tom Begich confirms withdrawal

Hours before the 5 p.m. deadline to withdraw, second-place finisher Tom Begich, a Democrat and former state senator, officially filed his paperwork to quit the race.

Begich had announced his intentions on Friday, saying he is now supporting the first-place finisher, former state Rep. Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, a fellow Democrat.

In a written statement, prerecorded video and interviews after the announcement, Begich said that withdrawing means Democratic support is consolidated around a single candidate. 

That means more money for the Kreiss-Tomkins’ campaign and less chance of a split vote in November.

While Alaska uses ranked choice voting, which would allow voters to pick both Kreiss-Tomkins and Begich, results over the past four years show a significant number of voters decline to rank multiple candidates.

Lieutenant governor rejects fourth-place finisher Treg Taylor

Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom on Monday declined to certify former Attorney General Treg Taylor as one of the four finalists in Alaska’s top-four primary election for governor. 

Taylor, who finished fifth in the primary, was promoted to fourth after the withdrawal of the second-place finisher, Democratic candidate Tom Begich.

Dahlstrom’s decision, announced by email, came after the Alaska Public Offices Commission voted 4-1 to recommend Taylor’s disqualification for failing to complete a personal financial disclosure required by law.

Nick Begich III announces endorsement of Bernadette Wilson

Alaska’s incumbent U.S. Representative, Republican Nick Begich III, said he is endorsing Republican businesswoman Bernadette Wilson as his preference for Alaska’s next governor.

Begich is running for re-election this year; Wilson worked on his prior campaigns for U.S. House, and Begich had previously vowed to support the top-finishing Republican candidate.

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders endorsed Wilson on Saturday, as did U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds, the leading Republican candidate to become Florida’s next governor.

Turnout is highest for regular primary election since 2014

According to Monday’s certified results, 166,992 voters participated in the August primary election, the most since the 2022 primary, which coincided with a special general election following the death of U.S. Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, earlier that year.

Excluding that race, turnout this year was the highest for a primary since 2014, when voters decided a high-profile referendum on whether or not to repeal an oilindustry tax cut. 

In terms of the number of votes cast, the 2026 primary was the fourth-largest in state history; in terms of percentage turnout, it was the 18th largest since 1974.