Did Alaskans take part in an “anti-incumbent wave” this past week? That’s how political consultant Taylor Bickford described the results of Tuesday’s primary election. And the Alaska Dispatch News tried to spin that into voter frustration over the Legislature’s inability to address the state’s multibillion-dollar budget deficit.
Unfortunately, what washed onto the Legislature’s doorstep was just a ripple containing more evidence of public apathy than dissatisfaction.
Only 15 percent of the state’s registered voters bothered to go to the polls. That dismal turnout undermines every theory about whether public prefers for more cuts in state government, capping the Permanent Fund Dividend, raising taxes or simply borrowing billions of dollars from the Constitutional Budget Reserve until that account is closed.
In 10 state senate races, the only incumbent to face a primary challenger was Shelley Hughes, R-Mat-Su. She’s a member of the Senate Majority caucus that accomplished nothing in terms of addressing the budget deficit. She won despite getting get slightly less votes than the combined total of her two opponents. Anti-incumbent sentiment might have been a factor there but it wasn’t a wave.
Majority Leader John Coghill, R-Fairbanks, wasn’t challenged. Neither were Cathy Geissel, R-Anchorage, Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, Bert Stedman, R-Southern Southeast, or Donny Olson D-Arctic/Bering, all members of Coghill’s team. Stedman and Olson will also run unopposed in the general election. On the minority side, Bill Wielechowski of Anchorage was the only name on his district’s Democratic primary ballot.
Speaker Mike Chenault, the most powerful House member, along with majority and minority leaders, were among the 24 incumbents who ran unopposed.
Of the 12 House incumbents who faced opposition, half of them lost, although Ben Nageak, D-Barrow, only trails by five votes and may come out on top by the time the results are certified. Two other majority house incumbents lost their bids to move up to the state Senate.
From a state budget viewpoint, looking at the seven incumbent losses is a mixed bag. The notable names who won’t be returning to Juneau next winter include Bob Lynn, R-Anchorage, Wes Keller, R-Mat-Su, and Bob Herron, D-Bethel, all part of the House majority stonewalling team. Like Nageak, Herron lacked support from his own Democratic party because he caucused with the majority.
Lynn Gattis and Craig Johnson are the two House majority members who GOP voters refused to send to the upper chamber. But their defeats could be attributed to unforgiveable poor judgment. Gattis displayed Trumpian insensitively by suggesting senior citizens should migrate south if they don’t like the budget cuts affecting them. And Johnson made the decision to waste more state money appealing the Superior Court decision which allowed Gov. Bill Walker’s Medicaid expansion plans to proceed.
Rep. Jim Colver lost his District 9 seat. But he was a freshman who disagreed with the majority’s position on reforming oil-tax credits and tapping Permanent Fund earnings to help pay for state government. In other words, he wasn’t part of the problem because he was realistic and open-minded enough to publicly acknowledge new revenue sources are needed.
Rep. Lora Reinbold, R-Eagle River, comfortably won her race. She’s the House member who shouted the loudest against doing anything until state government was sliced and diced into tiny sheds of its former self. That’s why she voted against the budget approved by the majority in 2015. It was an act that got her kicked out of the caucus. While I have to admire her independence, she’s definitely an incumbent I hoped would lose.
So overall, I think the election story by the Dispatch News was a case of wishful thinking. Reporters sought evidence to support their own frustration toward the legislative inaction on the budget.
You can call that biased journalism. But I think they were well justified in hoping to see voters send incumbents packing. After all, news reporters not only witnessed the incompetence on a daily basis. They strived to inform the public in non-judgmental manner. And that’s a tough job, especially when, based on newspaper subscriptions and television news ratings, most voters aren’t paying serious attention to the Legislature’s work.
The real loser in this primary election wasn’t incumbents or the news coverage that suggested they were. It was the ideals of democracy, handily defeated by the 430,000 registered Alaskan voters who apparently don’t care who represents them. And unless we find a cure for the epidemic of apathy they displayed, we can expect the next few years to be more of the same irresponsible legislative leadership we’ve seen the past two years.
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