Election 2020: Voters have options to cast their ballots

Lieutenant Governor Kevin Meyer has announced that this year’s elections will not be solely by mail because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Under existing state law, any voter can vote by mail or vote early for any reason, and the state will encourage voters to utilize these options while keeping in-person voting open on election day with extra public health precautions. The move is in line with other states, many of which have expanded absentee voting, but none of which have cancelled in-person voting altogether.

Primary elections will still be held on August 18, and general elections on November 3.

Lt. Gov. Meyer gave a number of reasons for maintaining in-person voting in a virtual town hall meeting, including the complexities of juggling Republican and Democratic/Independence ballots in the primaries, ballots in multiple languages, and ballots for voters with special needs. Given the uncertainty of which ballots should go to which voters, he estimated that around 600,000 ballots would go unused if the state switched to a mandatory mail-in election, which raised concerns about voter fraud.

Existing state policies regarding mail-in and early voting are already flexible compared to other states. Any voter, regardless of their reason, can apply for a mail-in ballot with the state’s new online application, by mail, or by calling the Alaska Division of Elections 10 days before the election day. Voters also have the option to vote early, casting their ballot in person at certain polling stations up to 15 days before the day of the election.

In Nome, early voting is located at the Region IV Elections Office, in the Sitnasuak Building on Front Street.

The Office of the Lieutenant Governor will run a social media campaign closer to the elections encouraging voters to vote early and by mail, with the aim of reducing crowds on election day. They will also send mail-in voting applications to all registered voters over 65-yearsold. As has been the case in past elections, voters voting by mail will still need to pay for their own postage, because the pandemic and response came too late for the legislature to change state voting laws, according to Lt. Gov. Meyer. However, he pointed out that voters still have the option of dropping off their mail-in ballot in person at a polling place.

For in-person voting, the state will encourage voters to wear masks at all times while at the polls, and will provide masks and gloves to voters who need them. Election staff will wear full personal protective equipment and enforce social distancing, and polling stations will be disinfected regularly. The election day polling stations in Nome will be at Old St. Joe’s.

The Division of Elections is already experiencing a shortage of poll workers statewide, according to Region IV Elections Supervisor Angelique Horton, who is based in Nome. To accommodate this, the state will implement the new “Adopt-A-Precinct” program, in which community groups can volunteer to staff a polling station and in return the state will donate up to $1,475 to a charity of the group’s choice.

This year’s elections will feature no ballot measures in the primary, but two ballot measures in the general, the Top-Four Ranked-Choice Voting and Campaign Finance Initiative and the Alaska North Slope Oil Production Tax Increase Initiative, commonly known as the Fair Share Act.

The former would institute open, top-four ranked-choice voting in the primaries, to replace the current partisan primary ballots, as well as ranked-choice voting in all general elections, including the presidential election. Under a ranked-choice voting system, voters list their chosen candidates in order of preference instead of voting for just one, and their vote is automatically transferred to lower-ranked preferences if their higher-ranked preferences lack sufficient votes to win. If the measure passes, Alaska would join Maine as one of the only states with rankedchoice voting for state and federal elections. The measure would also require campaign donors who contribute more than $2,000 to disclose the legally “true sources” of their contributions.

The second ballot measure, known by many as the Fair Share Act, would raise taxes on high-output oil fields in the North Slope region. The measure has been hotly contested, with proponents of the tax pointing to existing tax breaks for oil and gas companies and opponents pointing to the economic impact of increased taxes. The initiative in support of the measure, Vote Yes for Alaska’s Fair Share, raised almost $193,000 mostly through personal donations, according to the Alaska Public Offices Commission’s campaign disclosure reports. The initiative opposing the measure, OneAlaska, raised more than $3.5 million, mostly from oil and gas companies ConocoPhillips Alaska, Hilcorp Energy, BP Exploration Alaska and ExxonMobil.

Residents of Nome and its surrounding communities will vote in contested elections for both state senate and state house, the first contested elections for either seat in recent years. For the Senate, two Republicans will face off in the August primary, Thomas Baker and Calvin Moto II, the winner of which will run against Democrat incumbent Donald “Donny” Olson in the November election. Olson first entered office in 2001 and has run unopposed in the last two elections.

For the House of Representatives, Democrat incumbent Neal Foster will run against Tyler Ivanoff in the primary, and the winner will run against Republican Dan Holmes in the general election. Rep. Foster first entered office in 2009, and has run unopposed in the last four elections.

In the federal elections, Alaska Senator Daniel Sullivan will run against the winner of the Democratic/Independence primary, which currently consists of Democrat Edgar Blatchford, the Alaskan Independence Party’s John Howe, and independent candidates Chris Cumings and Al Gross. Candidates for the state’s one at-large seat in the House of Representatives are Democrats William Hibler and Ray Sean Tugatuk and independent Alyse Galvin in the Democratic/Independence primary, and Gerald Heikes, Thomas Nelson, and incumbent Don Young in the Republican primary.

Main candidates for the November presidential election will presumably be Democratic former Vice President Joe Biden and Republican President Donald Trump.