Democrats have captured Alaska’s governor’s seat for the first time in nearly three decades, marking another major victory for their party in a midterm election period that has dramatically shifted political power across the US.
Former Alaska state legislator Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins defeated three Republican opponents, including a candidate backed by US president Donald Trump, becoming the first Democrat elected governor of Alaska since 1998.
His victory – called by the Associated Press on Friday, 10 days after the polls closed – adds to a growing list of Democratic gains nationwide, bringing the party’s total to 30 US governorships. Democrats have also taken control of governor’s offices in several other long-time Republican strongholds, including Iowa, Georgia, Ohio and Texas.
Kreiss-Tomkins, widely known as JKT, secured the win having mounted a political comeback three years after departing the Alaska house of representatives.
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The 37-year-old travelled extensively throughout the state during his campaign, building support around economic concerns and a promise to change the direction of Alaska’s government.
His platform centred on tackling affordability, ensuring full funding for public education, and requiring all oil and gas producers to pay corporate income taxes. He also pushed for a temporary halt to new data centre developments until state lawmakers establish regulations governing their construction.
Throughout the campaign, Kreiss-Tomkins sharply criticised the leadership of outgoing the Republican governor, Mike Dunleavy, arguing that Alaska had become “broken” during his eight years in office.
“Alaskans are hungry for change,” Kreiss-Tomkins said. “We’ve been running the same campaign since we launched in February, and I don’t take anyone’s vote for granted.”
Among his criticisms was the deterioration of the state’s ferry system, which Kreiss-Tomkins said had been left in disarray as service to numerous communities was drastically reduced. The ferry network serves as a critical transportation link for communities in southeast Alaska that lack road connections, including some with limited access to air travel.
Despite his criticism of the outgoing administration, Kreiss-Tomkins presented himself as a leader willing to work across political divisions. He pledged to assemble a cabinet that includes Democrats, Republicans and independents.
Unlike most states, Alaska allows voters to rank candidates by preference through ranked-choice voting – a system that also permits multiple candidates from the same political party to run against one another.
But Kreiss-Tomkins avoided the need for additional rounds of vote counting after winning more than 50 per cent of first-choice votes, securing an outright victory.
The Alaska result comes just days after Democrats scored another major gubernatorial win in staunchly conservative Kansas, where the Democratic state senator Cindy Holscher narrowly defeated the Republican state senate president, Ty Masterson.
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Masterson, who received Trump’s endorsement, faced a campaign in which Holscher repeatedly highlighted his ties to the Republican president. At the same time, Holscher maintained that she would remain willing to co-operate with the Trump administration on issues where common ground could be found.
The back-to-back victories in Alaska and Kansas underscore the scale of Democratic gains in what has become a nationwide electoral shift.
The party’s long-anticipated “blue wave” has now materialised, with Democrats flipping eight seats in the US Senate, gaining more than two dozen seats in the House and significantly expanding their control of governors’ offices after the November 3rd midterms.
Such gains have handed Democrats a strong majority in Congress for the latter half of Trump’s second presidency, delivering a major shift in the balance of power in Washington and state governments across the US.
Meanwhile, with few ballots left to count for Alaska’s midterm US Senate election, Democrat Mary Peltola on Saturday was leading Republican incumbent Dan S Sullivan, Alaska Public Media reported. That had prompted MS Now to characterise that Senate race as “leans Democratic”.
Beside Alaska and Kansas, the Democratic Party won gubernatorial elections over Republicans in Georgia, Iowa, Nevada, Ohio and Texas, putting them in control of a majority of governorships for the first time since 2010. Gina Hinojosa is the first Democrat to be elected governor of Texas in 35 years – and also the state’s first Hispanic governor.
A major factor in the GOP’s midterm defeat is the unpopularity of Trump, whom most Republican lawmakers clung to even as polls indicated voters did not support his immigration crackdown, tariffs, the war with Iran or his signature domestic policy bill. – The Guardian
