Alaska voters have elected a Democrat as governor for the first time since 1998. The Associated Press called the race for Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins early on Saturday, more than ten days after the November 3 midterm elections.
Kreiss-Tomkins, 37, took 50.8 percent of first-choice votes, according to unofficial results. He defeated three Republican candidates, including Bernadette Wilson, a business owner endorsed by President Donald Trump.
The win gives Democrats the governor’s office in 30 states. It caps a midterm cycle in which the party flipped several governorships after years of Republican control, including in Iowa, Georgia, Ohio and Texas.
Kreiss-Tomkins served in the Alaska House of Representatives from 2013 to 2023. He left the chamber three years ago and framed his campaign around fixing a state he described as broken after eight years under outgoing Republican Governor Mike Dunleavy.
Dunleavy has held the office since 2018 and could not seek a third consecutive term because of term limits. Kreiss-Tomkins will take office on December 7 as the youngest governor in Alaska’s history, with independent Zac Johnson as lieutenant governor.
The state’s last Democratic governor, Tony Knowles, won re-election in 1998 and left office in 2002. The results remain unofficial until the state certifies them later this month.
Source: Reuters
