Lies, and more lies: Vote No on 2 flyer leaves out Alaska’s history of independent participation in primaries

By SUZANNE DOWNING

Oct. 19, 2026 – A Vote No on 2 flyer warns that repealing Alaska’s current election system would allow political parties to block independent voters from their primaries. What that warning leaves out is that Alaska’s former Republican primary was open to voters registered as nonpartisan or undeclared.

Those voters did not have to become Republicans to help choose Republican nominees.

The Alaska Division of Elections’ historical account confirms that in 2020, Republicans, nonpartisans, and undeclared voters could all participate in the Republican primary. Registered Democrats and members of other parties could not take a Republican ballot without changing their registration. They could do so right at the voting place.

That history is important as Alaskans consider Ballot Measure 2 on Nov. 3. The measure would repeal the top-four jungle primary and ranked-choice general election system, restore party primaries and single-choice general elections, and repeal certain campaign finance provisions adopted in 2020.

The official ballot summary says voters would choose a party’s primary ballot unless prohibited by that party’s bylaws. That would give parties authority over participation, but it would not itself require the Republican Party to exclude the nonpartisan and undeclared voters it previously welcomed.

The flyer’s reference to independents also needs context. Alaska’s registration system distinguishes between nonpartisan and undeclared voters.  There are no “independents” in Alaska.

“Like most Alaskans, I don’t register with a political party. In Alaska, I have the freedom to vote for whichever candidate I want in every election. Measure 2 would take that freedom away, and allow political parties to block independents from voting in primary elections,” the man (Heath D.) says on the flier that went out opposing Ballot Measure 2. The flier is paid for by top three contributors: Unite America PAC, Voeters for the American Center, Inc., and NEA — the big teachers’ union that backs Democrats.

Among donors to the No on 2 campaign are these Democrats:

Another distinction deserves attention in the debate over ranked-choice voting: A winning majority in the final round is not necessarily a majority of everyone who cast a valid vote in that race.

Alaska calculates its ranked-choice threshold using continuing ballots in each round. Ballots that become inactive, commonly called exhausted ballots, are excluded from later tabulations.

For example, a voter might rank only one candidate. If that candidate is eliminated, the ballot has no remaining choice to transfer to. It counted while that candidate remained in contention, but it does not count toward either finalist’s total. Certain ballot-marking errors can also make a ballot inactive.

Consider a hypothetical race with 100,000 valid starting votes. If 20,000 ballots become exhausted, 80,000 remain in the final tally. A candidate receiving 40,001 votes would have a majority of those continuing ballots — but only about 40% of the original 100,000 votes.

This is a point few Alaska voters have grasped: The winner’s percentage of the original vote depends on how many ballots become exhausted. Ranked-choice voting therefore does not guarantee that the winner receives support from more than half of the voters who initially participated in the contest.

Voters weighing Measure 2 deserve both explanations: Unaffiliated Alaskans participated in the old Republican primaries, and a ranked-choice majority can be calculated from a smaller pool of ballots than the one that began the count.