State improperly deletes naturalized citizens from voter rolls
The lieutenant governor has only one job—other than looking after the state seal—and Nancy Dahlstrom isn’t getting the job done in supervising the Division of Elections.
In removing thousands of names from Alaska’s voter rolls, Division of Elections Directory Carol Beecher admitted to legislators this week, the state used old data that hasn’t been checked.
This Alaska Beacon story by James Brooks and Corinne Smith does a good job in detailing the debacle:
“Based on interviews with affected people, the records flagged by the DMV appear to include Alaskans who obtained driver’s licenses as noncitizens, then became citizens and registered to vote, but have not received a new driver’s license since becoming a citizen.”
The state does not know how many people it is wrongfully classified as ineligible and wants to put the onus on individuals to contact the Division of Elections and correct the state’s error.
Chris Waigl of Fairbanks got her Alaska driver’s license in 2019 and became an American citizen in 2025. She became alarmed after checking her registration status last weekend, only to learn that she was listed as “inactive – non citizen.”
“They were able to correct it there and then after I sent in copies of my naturalization certificate with a date before my voter registration date,” she said by email.
But Waigl went further, contacting four other people who became naturalized citizens at the same time she did. Of those, only one said they were still listed as an active voter.
One of the others, reached by phone, said he was listed as inactive despite registering as a voter at the local DMV office and presenting his citizenship paperwork at that time.
Another naturalized citizen, living in Juneau and unaffiliated with Waigl, said they also were unregistered despite indicating on their Permanent Fund dividend application that they are a citizen.
Several people affected by the removal said they have attempted to contact the Division of Elections but have been unable to reach staff by phone, and that voicemail boxes have been full.
“It’s just ridiculous,” Waigl said.
She said the state’s policy of simply sending a letter is inadequate, particularly because there may be legal consequences if the state or federal government believes someone has voted as a noncitizen.
“Citizenship rights, immigration is something I’m interested in for obvious reasons,” she said.
For more on this mess, this analysis by Matt Buxton summarizes the trouble:
In total, the Division of Elections' effort to "clean up" the voter rolls ahead of the 2026 election — seemingly an extension and, effectively, the implementation of Trump's cruel attempts to make it harder to vote by fear mongering over illegal immigrants voting — has removed more than 3,000 voters this year. Infuriatingly, the Division of Elections seems to have known full well that the process was messy, inaccurate and likely to flag citizens as noncitizen voters. According to an excellent report by the Alaska Beacon, the disqualifications led to total voter enrollment declining, which is deeply unusual during an election year, and seems to be largely affecting voters who got a driver's license as a noncitizen but have since become citizens and are in the window before they need to renew their driver's license.
It's a problem that the DMV even seemed to flag in a memo, outlining how the "non-routine request" of drivers' citizenship shouldn't be considered a formal determination of their current status, just their status when they got their license.
Hickel’s family speaks out
Republican gubernatorial candidate Bernadette Wilson has been presenting herself as the political reincarnation of Wally Hickel.
Hickel’s children, the owners of the Hickel Investment Co., have demanded that she knock it off. They said what she is doing is misleading and disrespectful.
They said Wilson has promoted the “false narrative that there is some sort of close connection between Governor Hickel and your candidacy,” according to this letter released by the family Friday.
“The misuse of his memory in this way needs to stop immediately,” said Hickel’s children.
The best coverage of this is in the Anchorage Daily News. Wally’s brother Vern, who had 17 children, was Wilson’s grandfather. He had 72 grandchildren.
Wilson has compared herself to Hickel and claimed that she is an outsider, just as he was.
The difference between her and Hickel is that Wally Hickel was a leading figure in Alaska politics for many years before he decided to run for office. Wilson has not been.
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