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Many early and absentee voting sites in rural Alaska villages fail to open, officials say
Failure of at least 18 locations to open violates ‘a variety of state and federal laws,’ state senator says; Division of Elections asks people to notify them if problems are occurring
By Mark Sabbatini
Juneau Independent
At least 18 remote villages where Alaska Natives are a majority of the population failed to open early and in-person absentee voting sites during the first week of early balloting, according to officials.
The reports come as questions about oversight of the midterm elections in Alaska are in the international spotlight, due to actions by the Trump administration and the Alaska Division of Elections that critics say are illegally seeking to boost certain Republican candidates. However, voting difficulties in rural Alaska have been an ongoing issue for years, creating uncertainties about the current cause of locations not opening as scheduled.
"What they don’t know is if the closed polling places are a result of a purposeful attempt to block thousands from voting or because voting has always been tricky to manage in the far-flung, rural villages of Alaska’s wilderness," The New York Times reported Saturday in a story that appeared at the top of its website along with other articles about President Donald Trump’s intervention in elections in Alaska and other states.
Stephen Kirch, a Division of Elections spokesperson, told the Juneau Independent on Saturday that elections officials are aware of the concerns raised, and are checking the status of sites with people in the villages named and updating the state’s list of early voting sites as needed. He characterized the situation as an inadvertent one involving communications difficulties, among other factors, rather than willful action.
"If people in the community are aware that it's not open please let us know it's not open so we can address it," he said.
Some Alaska Native voting advocates said they didn’t see the past week’s problems as overly suspicious.
“This is just the usual logistical failure,” Michelle Sparck, director of Get Out the Native Vote, told The New York Times.
The districts affected are among those most likely to support Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Mary Peltola, who is challenging two-term Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan in what is expected to be a close race that could determine which party controls the chamber for the remaining two years of Trump’s second term.
The matter was first raised in a letter Friday by state Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage, to Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom and Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher. The senator states that in some cases "the local partners who were supposed to operate the voting sites reported that they did not receive the necessary materials or even know they were expected to operate a voting site for the general election."
"The failure to open absentee in-person voting locations on time is particularly troubling considering that in the primary election in August, dozens of rural Alaskan voters did not have their absentee in-person votes counted because it took too long for their ballots to arrive by mail to the Division’s regional office," Wielechowski wrote. "In light of this issue, rural voters who want to ensure their absentee in person votes were counted would want to vote earlier to allow more time for their ballots to be mailed to the regional office."
The sites listed as failing to open after early and absentee voting began Oct. 19 are Alakanuk, Chignik Bay, Chistochina, Ekwok, Gambell, Goodnews Bay, Holy Cross, Huslia, Kongiganak, Manokotak, Mountain Village, Nanwalek, Napaskiak, Newhalen, Pedro Bay, Pilot Station, Quinhagak and Toksook Bay.
"This count does not include closures for Alaska Day, and it reflects only the communities that have reported — so the number of closures could easily be much higher," Wielechowski wrote.
Kirch told the Independent he could not specifically verify the status of each of the sites cited in Wielechowski’s letter. In a follow-up email, the election spokesperson noted "Levelock and Chignick Bay no longer have absentee in-person voting but do have in-person voting on Election Day" and "Kipnuk now has absentee in-person voting," and Holy Cross is a temporary closure and has also been updated on our website."
Early voter turnout during the first week was lowest in four districts in northern and western Alaska where Alaska Native people make up a majority of the population, the Anchorage Daily News reported Saturday. The article notes Juneau saw nearly 1,400 ballots representing 9% of eligible voters cast during the first three days of early voting, while in an Arctic district 27 ballots representing 0.3% of registered voters were cast.
Wielechowski, in his letter, stated the Legislature attempted to remedy ongoing concerns about rural voting in a bill passed during this year’s session, which Gov. Mike Dunleavy then vetoed — so "there is no legal excuse for the failure to open these sites."
"The Legislature passed Senate Bill 64 which would have helped provide additional assistance for rural voting — such as a rural liaison to assist in getting poll workers, and provisions to more easily allow the Division to raise poll worker pay to help attract workers," Wielechowski wrote. "But this bill was vetoed by Gov. Dunleavy at the request of the Division, who maintained that bill was not needed this election. So there are no excuses."
Dunleavy, in letters to legislative leaders explaining his veto, stated the bill’s provisions "would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to implement securely and reliably in advance of the 2026 elections."
The Division of Elections and other Dunleavy administration officials have been under scrutiny for a series of actions over the past several months. Those include turning over confidential voter data to the Trump administration, removing thousands of people from voter rolls due to alleged citizenship questions, seeking to cast doubt on most state candidates’ campaign finance paperwork after restoring two Republican candidates to the ballot whose filings failed to meet requirements, and an unsuccessful attempt to remove U.S. Senate candidate Dan J. Sullivan from the ballot because of his nearly identical name to Republican incumbent Dan S. Sullivan.
Global attention is now focused on the Senate race due to Trump ordering the U.S. Department of Justice to file a lawsuit demanding the election not be certified if Dan S. Sullivan loses by a margin smaller than the number of votes Dan J. Sullivan receives.
• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.
