By SUZANNE DOWNING
July 19, 2026 – Alaska Survey Research founder and president Ivan Moore is openly questioning why Democrats appear to have cleared the way for Bill Hill in Alaska’s US House race, when Moore’s recent polling showed Matt Schultz was the considerably stronger challenger to Republican Congressman Nick Begich.
Schultz announced Friday that he was suspending his campaign for Congress, abruptly removing the leading declared Democrat from the race. His departure leaves Hill, an undeclared candidate who has said he would caucus with Democrats, with a clearer path to becoming the principal challenger to Begich.
Moore, whose firm is frequently retained by Democratic candidates, unions, and left-leaning organizations, said the maneuver makes little sense based on his polling.
“The Dems just cannot stop shooting themselves in the foot,” Moore wrote on social media.
Moore said Alaska Survey Research conducted a simulated ranked-choice contest just a few weeks ago involving Begich, Schultz, Hill, and fourth candidate Clay Strickland. Once the race reached its final three candidates, Begich crossed the 50% threshold and won:
Nick Begich received 52.5%, Schultz had 30.9%, and Hill trailed with 16.6%.
“It’s no contest between Schultz and Hill at that point,” Moore wrote.
His firm also extrapolated hypothetical head-to-head matchups from voters’ preference data. With Hill eliminated, Begich led Schultz 55.6% to 44.4%. But when Schultz was hypothetically removed, Begich’s advantage over Hill grew to 58.1% to 41.9%.
In other words, neither candidate was beating Begich in Moore’s survey, but Schultz ran more than five percentage points closer to the incumbent than Hill did. Schultz also held nearly twice Hill’s support when all three remained in contention.
“But Bill Hill is supposedly the stronger candidate?” Moore wrote. “Okeydokey then.”
Moore’s criticism is notable because he is not typically a public antagonist of Alaska Democrats. He is one of the polling professionals they regularly trust, making his blunt assessment an unusual rebuke of his own client base.
Schultz did not say in his withdrawal statement that Democratic leaders forced him from the race. He thanked his supporters and said he would continue working for “justice” and against “the corrupting influence of big money in our politics.”
Still, the timing of his exit, and the apparent benefit to Hill, raises questions about whether party insiders, donors, or other Democratic power brokers encouraged Schultz to stand down in an effort to consolidate opposition to Begich.
If that was the strategy, Moore’s numbers suggest they may have consolidated behind the weaker candidate.
Begich is seeking his first reelection after winning Alaska’s lone US House seat in 2024, unseating Mary Peltola. Schultz’s withdrawal gives Hill a cleaner shot at advancing as Begich’s leading opponent, but it does nothing to resolve the underlying problem identified by one of Alaska Democrats’ own favored pollsters: Hill was running well behind the candidate who just left the race, although Schultz will still remain on the ballot since he missed the cutoff date for removing his name.
10 thoughts on “Alaska Democrats’ favorite pollster Ivan Moore says he’s puzzled by them forcing Schultz out”
Matt’s X posts make him unelectable without cheating on a scale that risks detection by non-Democrats.
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Six examples appear at https://alaskalandmine.com/landmines/the-sunday-minefield-october-19-2025/.
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In what reality, Ivan, would a majority of Alaskan-Americans vote for someone who says what Matt says in his posts?
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Maybe that’s the polling question you should be asking, no?
What, like that he says he’s pro-choice? So are the clear majority of Alaskans. Are you? If you’re not, it’s Schultz who is in the majority, not you.
If I understand it correctly, the Reverend Schultz only suspended his campaign after the candidate withdrawal period and if he ends up in the top four in the jungle primary he will still advance to the general election. It might be worth a primary vote for those who understand that our current jungle primary and rank voting scheme is just a big game instead of an election.
Maybe his hard drive needs to be checked out
They found their completely controlled robot candidate. rHill must be a total yes- man sycophant For every kook exTreme idea the far Left has.
Hey Ivan Moore……..Do you want an education? Subscribe to Alaska Story.
Sign up for classes by Professor Downing. You might learn something.
Remember when AL Gross dropped out? For sure he got a big chunk of money to do that. Mary needed protection.
Perhaps AKDemocrats are refocusing to concentrate on the Governor’s race instead of the US House race that shows US Congressman Nicholas Begich iii is unbeatable
They are so close to complete control of Alaska. They got the judicial. They got control over the legislature, they got the union groups, Alaskans are government dependent, and now they just need the Governor’s office.
They can let the national DNC group worry about next year’s Congress while AkDemocrats concentrate toward total domination of Alaska from 2027-2032.
A few changes to elections under a Democrat Governor and Democrat controlled legislature, they’ll get their Democrat US Senators and US House.
Imagine if we never had a 17th Amendment to the US Constitution. How long do you think the people of this state or ‘leaders of any party’ would allow such as these ‘rino clowns’ that roam the halls in Juneau to even remain in their party? Party’s would have real platforms and there would real (you’re fired!) consequences to disloyalty to that platform. And with an appropriate body of conservative state legislators, we would have a solid (as in NOT Princess!) suite of federal representatives in Disneyland on the Potomac.
Oh dear, here we go again with the same old tired trope about Ivan being a lefty. It’s all very well for someone to think this privately, but for it to be published as news is incorrect, and serves only to diminish your credibility. I can literally count on the fingers of one hand the number of times I’ve done any work for “unions” in 30 years of doing the work I do. I currently work for as many Republican candidates as I do Democrats – in fact, these days, I try to do as little work as possible for candidates of all stripes. And I also work as often for right-leaning organizations as I do for the horrid, woke, “left-leaning” ones.
If you want to be taken seriously as a provider of news, try and get these things right.