Photo credit: Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins for Governor
By BallotWire
11/14/2026
The Wire: Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins won Alaska’s governor’s race, flipping the office from Republican control and, at 37, becoming the youngest person ever elected governor of the state. The Associated Press called the race Saturday after he secured a majority of first-choice votes against a field of Republicans, including Trump-endorsed Bernadette Wilson.
Why it counts: Kreiss-Tomkins will be Alaska’s first Democratic governor since Tony Knowles, last elected in 1998, and next year the youngest sitting governor in the country. His win was the latest in a string of Democratic gains at the state level this cycle, bringing the party to 30 governorships nationwide, its largest total in years.
The margin: Kreiss-Tomkins took about 50.8% of first-choice votes, clearing the majority threshold needed to win outright and avoiding a ranked-choice runoff. Wilson, the top Republican, finished a distant second at roughly 28%. Several thousand ballots remained to be counted, and the totals are not yet final, but his lead was decisive enough that Wilson conceded.
The fine print: Alaska sends the top four finishers from a nonpartisan primary to a ranked-choice general election, and three Republicans on the ballot split the conservative vote: Wilson, former Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson and former state Attorney General Treg Taylor. That division, in a state that usually votes Republican, opened the path for Kreiss-Tomkins. On the same ballot, Alaskans rejected a measure to repeal ranked-choice voting, keeping the system intact.
On the record: Kreiss-Tomkins ran on working across party lines and drew a handful of Republican endorsements in the closing stretch. “Alaskans voted for change and for a government that works across party lines to move Alaska forward,” he said in declaring victory.
The counter: Wilson, an Anchorage business owner, was the only one of the three Republicans to carry Trump’s endorsement and campaigned on a combative, partisan approach. The split among the GOP contenders proved decisive, and national Republicans were unable to consolidate behind a single candidate under the ranked-choice format.
The backdrop: Alaska has not elected a Democratic governor in more than two decades and reliably backs Republicans at the presidential level, making the flip a notable addition to the Democrats’ strong year in governor’s races. The result also underscored how the state’s primary and ranked-choice rules, which voters again declined to scrap, can reshape outcomes when one party’s field is divided.
Looking ahead: Kreiss-Tomkins will succeed term-limited Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy and is set to take office December 7.