By CARMELA J. WARFIELD
Oct. 12, 2026 – Alaska is bigger than Texas, California and Montana combined, and Washington owns 60% of it. Here at home, a new mine, a new road or a new clinic oGen starts with a federal permit.
My husband, Jason, and I built our lives here. We are raising our two sons here. And we watched with grave concern for their future as Joe Biden locked up Alaska with the help of far-left liberals like Mary Peltola.
Alaskans fish, mine, drill and build for a living. Our families need work, and our communities need clinics. Neither comes from a federal government that locks up our land. President Trump knows this, and that’s why he’s returning to rally in Alaska for the second time, to make sure that the wins for Alaskans keep coming.
Last October, the Trump administration approved the 211-mile Ambler Road to the copper and cobalt deposits of the Northwest Arctic a project projected to support 2,730 jobs.
The Department of the Interior reopened all 1.56 million acres of ANWR’s Coastal Plain to leasing and reapproved the King Cove road.
The tax law passed by Republicans locked those wins in. Sen. Dan Sullivan wrote mandatory lease sales for ANWR, the NPR-A and Cook Inlet into it, so Alaska development no longer depends on who sits in the White House. The same law gives the average Alaska filer a $3,503 tax cut in 2026. I spent my career in banking and finance before running my own business, and I know that when hardworking Alaskans keep more of what they earn, that strengthens families, supports local businesses, and grows our economy.
Rural health may be the biggest story. Alaska landed $272.2 million in first-year Rural Health TransformaLon funds, the largest per-capita award in the country. Already, $242.6 million has gone to 250 projects, including $4.8 million for the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium to expand pharmacy access.
Two years ago, Alaska Republicans took back our lone House seat from Mary Peltola. Now she wants a Senate seat. That would be a disaster. In 2023 she co-sponsored a bill reversing Biden-era restrictions on ANWR and NPR-A leasing,
then urged her colleagues to vote it down and she herself voted “present” when it reached the floor.
Behind closed doors, the picture is worse. Former aides told the New York Times she shoved a staffer in her congressional office and regularly lashed out at her team, made up of young Alaskans who only wanted to serve their country and our state.
The Times also reported texts in which she hoped an Alaskan woman “died of a botched abortion.” Alaskans deserve better from someone asking for our Senate seat.
A vote for Peltola is also a vote for a Senate majority run by the party that shut down ANWR leasing and blocked Ambler.
The House race is also of critical importance. Congressman Nick Begich led the effort to overturn the Biden rule restricting Arctic refuge drilling and is the most successful freshman legislator of all time, going back to the founding of our country.
His main opponent, fake independent Bill Hill, is on the ballot because Democrats cleared the field for him. Hill told a Peltola town hall this year that Alaska needs to “get off the sauce” of oil and gas. In Hill’s decade as Bristol Bay Borough superintendent, proficiency scores fell under 10% districtwide by his final year. That number stops me cold as a mother.
I represent the Western states on the Republican National Committee’s Executive Committee. When I tell colleagues what Alaska needs, it’s simple: a Washington that says yes. That’s why Alaska Republicans are asking voters to rank Dan S. Sullivan and Nick Begich first. And, to rank Republicans up and down the ballot. Do not cast a vote for a Democrat. Keep
Washington saying yes, and help us ensure Alaska is open for business.
Carmela Warfield is chairman of the Alaska Republican Party.
2 thoughts on “Carmela Warfield: Alaska finally has a Washington that says ‘yes’ with President Trump – let’s keep it that way”
You have done a terrible job.
The three candidates for guv as the starter, the many repubs like Stutes still running as repubs as the finisher.
In fact, what have you actually done?
Until we get Ballot Measure 2 passed to end rank choice voting and go back to a closed primary, there’s nothing Carmela Warfield or anyone else could have done to thin the ballot choices and weed out the RINOS. The AK Supreme Court has blocked multiple attempts by the AK GOP to police the ranks. You need to channel your anger elsewhere and actively support Ballot Measure 2.