The following voter guide was produced by the Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Public Media, the Alaska Beacon and KTOO Public Media. The Chilkat Valley News is republishing it with permission.
In the Nov. 3 general election, Alaska voters will decide consequential races for U.S. Senate, U.S. House, governor and the state Legislature, in addition to determining the fate of two ballot measures.
Under Alaska’s ranked choice voting system, in each race, voters can rank the candidates in order of preference on their ballot. If no candidate wins an outright majority of votes, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated, and those votes are then reallocated to second-choice candidates in what amounts to an instant runoff system. The process continues until a candidate receives more than 50% of the vote.
The Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Public Media, the Alaska Beacon and KTOO Public Media partnered to ask candidates for office a set of detailed issue questions. While a few candidates did not participate, the news organizations reached out to all of them multiple times and in multiple ways to ensure everyone had an opportunity to respond.
What you’ll see here are the candidates’ responses to those questions, many of which came directly from readers and listeners who shared what they wanted to hear about from the candidates.
Support for this collaboration was provided by the Alaska Center for Excellence in Journalism. Putting together a resource like this takes a significant amount of coordination and work. To support future efforts, consider subscribing to or donating to the Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Public Media, the Alaska Beacon or KTOO.
Compare the candidates
How to use this tool: For each race, you can see a candidate’s full list of answers by clicking on the candidate’s name or image at the top of the main page. Below the links to the candidates is a list of topics. Click on one to view how the candidates responded on that specific issue. You can also access comparisons from candidate pages. Legislative races are listed by district; you can find your Alaska Senate and House district by looking up your address in the state’s precinct finder tool.