Alaska voters just watched a classic red-state disaster unfold in slow motion.
Democrat Jonathan “JKT” Kreiss-Tomkins has been projected as the winner of the 2026 gubernatorial race, becoming the first Democrat elected governor of the Last Frontier since Tony Knowles in 1998.
The 37-year-old former state representative from Sitka will be sworn in on December 7 as the youngest governor in Alaska history after clearing 50% of first-choice votes and avoiding a full ranked-choice runoff.
With roughly 50.2% of first-choice ballots counted (around 126,000+ votes in mid-November tallies), Kreiss-Tomkins finished well ahead of the three Republicans on the ballot: Trump-endorsed Bernadette Wilson at about 28.7%, former Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson at roughly 13.7%, and former Attorney General Treg Taylor at about 7.3%, AP reported.
The split GOP field was exactly what critics of Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system warned about. Republicans collectively drew the majority of the primary vote, but failed to consolidate, allowing the lone Democrat to claim an outright majority on the first round.
As The Gateway Pundit previously reported, Senator Lisa Murkowski crossed party lines in October to endorse Kreiss-Tomkins.
Murkowski publicly supported the Democratic candidate despite President Trump’s endorsement of Republican Bernadette Wilson.
The Alaska senator argued that voters wanted new leadership in Juneau and praised Kreiss-Tomkins as someone capable of delivering change.
Her endorsement gave the Democrat an extraordinary boost from one of Alaska’s most prominent Republican officeholders.
Meanwhile, Trump had endorsed Wilson and urged the other Republican contenders to withdraw from the race.
They stayed in.
The result? Three Republicans appeared on the general election ballot against a single Democrat.
The GOP entered the contest divided, while Democrats consolidated their support behind Kreiss-Tomkins.
Kreiss-Tomkins, a Yale attendee who represented Southeast Alaska’s island communities in the state House for a decade, campaigned on affordability, healthcare expansion, and fisheries protection while collecting endorsements from Murkowski, former Gov. Frank Murkowski, independent former Gov. Bill Walker, and other cross-aisle figures.
His running mate is independent Zac Johnson. Outgoing Republican Dunleavy was term-limited after two terms; he had won re-election comfortably in 2022. Alaska has voted Republican in every presidential election since 1968, yet the state’s unique voting rules produced this result.
Opponents of ranked-choice voting have long argued the system confuses voters, suppresses full ranking by skeptical conservatives, and systematically advantages Democrats and establishment moderates in red-leaning states.
Alaska voters rejected a repeal measure in 2024 and again kept the system in 2026, but the governor’s race supplies fresh evidence for critics who say the rules undermine majority preference. Wilson, Bronson, and Taylor ultimately conceded the outcome once Kreiss-Tomkins crossed the 50% threshold.
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