Optimism and alarm about war, economy, state’s outlook offered by Murkowski in address to Legislature
- Mark Sabbatini
- 1 day ago
- 4 min read
‘The federal government is often beset by chaos these days,’ Alaska’s senior U.S. senator tells joint session of state lawmakers
By Mark Sabbatini
Juneau Independent
Lots of praise for things like expanding oil activity in the state and lots of warnings about things like impacts of the Iran war were offered by U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski during her annual address to the Alaska Legislature on Tuesday.
The hour-long address, followed by an hour of answering questions from legislators and reporters, was characteristic of Murkowski’s mixed support for President Donald Trump’s second-term actions. She is one of the few congressional Republicans who's been openly critical of him in major policy areas, in contrast to the two other members of Alaska’s all-Republican congressional delegation who are strong supporters of the president.
Despite that difference, Murkowski told legislators she agreed with Sen. Dan Sullivan and Rep. Nick Begich III on many of the reasons for optimism expressed in their speeches to the Legislature earlier this year. Those include a tax cut bill passed last year, and investments such as more aviation safety and U.S. Coast Guard assets.
"As we're meeting this morning nothing is going better for Alaska than resource development," Murkowski added. "Our state is no longer the special on the menu, but we are the heart of the plan."
Among the indicators of progress are new oil and mining projects in the works, plus record bidding earlier this month for the first new lease sales in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska since 2019, she said.
But Murkowski also implored legislators to pass a long-range fiscal plan — something talked about in various forms for decades, including when she was a state lawmaker at the turn of the millennium — declaring as they have that Alaska can’t count on oil revenue indefinitely. Also, she said, federal spending is going to inevitably tighten — and furthermore "the federal government is often beset by chaos these days."
"We're looking at the situation with the Department of Homeland Security being shut down now for 46 days," she said. "We have seen workers —whether they be TSA, FEMA, some in our Coast Guard — working without paychecks. We've seen many of our Alaskan families impacted as they move through long delays in airport security lines. But the problem that we're dealing with here is shutdowns are becoming far too routine and too many policymakers are just becoming numb to their impacts."
The war in Iran also marked another area where Murkowski offered split messages. She criticized Iran’s previous leadership and said U.S. soldiers there deserve full support, but denounced Trump’s threats to attack Iranian civilians and non-military infrastructure.
"The fact that the president said — and I hope he is not willing to move forward with this — but he has said that if Iran does not basically get in line that we would attack non-military targets," she said during a press conference following her appearance before the joint session of the Legislature. "Energy infrastructure. Water infrastructure. That's a completely different level of escalation. Boots on the ground. Everybody's asking ‘What's going to happen? Are we going to see boots on the ground?’ I don't know the answer to that."
Murkowski, a member of the Senate Defense Appropriations Committee, said the answers she’s getting from Trump administration officials are vague.
"I know that there is wartime strategy and I know that there are certain things that cannot be revealed ahead of time," she said. But I think it is, it is not asking too much to have a clear mission articulated by the president and his Secretary of Defense."
Other areas of concern raised by Murkowski about Trump administration actions included voting restrictions, targeting of federal contracts for Alaska Native Corporations, and immigration enforcement.
Trump on Tuesday signed an executive order seeking to federalize voter lists and restrict states’ use of by-mail ballots. He’s also pushing legislation that would ban mail ballots from being counted if they arrive after Election Day, and impose new requirements such as in-person registration that Murkowski and other officials say will disenfranchise a large number of rural voters in communities that don’t have official registration sites.
The senator told legislators they should also monitor a pending U.S. Supreme Court case that would also ban ballots arriving after Election Day.
Another target of the Trump administration is the 8(a) Business Development Program, a major source of funding for Alaska Native corporations that U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said earlier this year is “the oldest DEI program in the federal government.”
"Those who don't understand a day are trying to tear it down, even though it delivers value to the federal government and it helps fulfill the promise of (the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act)," Murkowski said. "And I want to be unequivocal in this area, we need to protect 8(a)."
Immigration enforcement was another area where Murkowski praised general objectives of the Trump administration, but took issue with some of the actions occurring.
"I think it is undeniably good that President Trump has closed the southern border to control it and I credit him for doing that. It’s important for our security," she said. "But when the extension of these policies results in a mother in Soldotna and her three children being taken into custody, with the mother deported and the oldest put in jail, I think it's time for serious reflection and reform of our immigration policies in this country."
Murkowski also continued her ongoing criticism of Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s failure to use hundreds of millions of federal funds to make intended vessel and infrastructure upgrades to the Alaska Marine Highway System, instead diverting money for operations in lieu of state funds. She said she’s concerned about a similar missed opportunity with a newly created Rural Health Transformation Fund, put in last year’s budget bill to purportedly counteract the effects of its sweeping Medicaid cuts in rural areas.
“The state needs to do dramatically better on this five-year effort than we did on ferries, just putting it out there, because if we don’t, Alaska’s funds can be redirected elsewhere, and we will miss a generational opportunity to improve care,” Murkowski said.
• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.
