Listen to the handful of public speeches that Republican Rep. Nick Begich III has given during his two years in office, and there’s a word you’ll hear a lot: Bipartisan.
“Ninety percent or more of the legislation that passes out of the House is bipartisan. It’s bipartisan. We see eye to eye on so many things,” he said in his annual address to the Alaska Legislature—which is controlled by two bipartisan coalition majorities—adding, “We had Republicans and Democrats working together on the Alaska bills that we’ve delivered.”
Over the hour-long speech, the freshman Republican cast himself as someone willing to work across the political aisle, particularly when it comes to energy development, while largely shying away from the most unpopular elements of President Donald Trump’s second term. In fact, Begich mentioned Trump by name just once during his speech.
It was a decidedly different approach from Republican US Sen. Dan Sullivan, whose address a few weeks prior was laced with partisan vitriol and finger-pointing at Democrats, who he claimed are entirely driven by their desire to “lock up” Alaska.
To observers, Begich’s efforts to appeal beyond the Trump base are a calculated move at a time when voters are increasingly weary of the president, his unpopular war with Iran, and lingering high costs. And it may have paid off in the state’s primary, where Begich finished with 4,000 more votes in his primary race than Sullivan got in his. But behind the public-facing differences, critics say, there’s little actual difference between the two in how they vote.
State Sen. Forrest Dunbar, D-Anchorage, who sparred with Sullivan over his support for cuts to Medicaid through his support of Trump’s Big, Beautiful Bill, said Begich’s approach seemed political.
“(Begich) has been much more conciliatory and made gestures to bipartisanship,” he told the Alaska Current. “Begich has been smarter than Sullivan politically in not being as publicly connected to MAGA, while still obviously swearing his fealty to them in their more private or exclusive spaces. He would never bash on Trump on talk radio, and he votes 100% for MAGA priorities in Congress, but he also likes to tout his bipartisan accomplishments, such as they are.”
As Dunbar argued, however, there’s realistically little in Begich’s voting record that would suggest there’s any daylight between him and more overtly Trump-supporting Republicans.
Like Sullivan, Begich supported the Big, Beautiful Bill, teeing up costly cuts to social programs like Medicaid—known as DenaliCare in Alaska—and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The SNAP cuts are based on a state’s error rate—a category in which Alaska leads—and the Medicaid cuts will be driven by paperwork-demanding work requirements, both of which will largely go into effect in Alaska after the midterm elections.
In fact, Begich has a 100% Trump score according to the nonpartisan political tracker VoteHub, which breaks down how often members of Congress vote with or against the president’s priorities.
Begich also supported the elimination of much of the funding for local Alaska radio stations that primarily serve rural areas, and voted against extending federal health care subsidies, leaving Alaskans who buy insurance via the Affordable Care Act marketplace paying as much as three times more.
In his first address to the Legislature in 2025, Begich celebrated the work of Elon Musk’s DOGE to root out alleged waste, but pledged to work to soften its impacts on Alaska. But the state ultimately lost more than 10% of its federal workforce during Trump’s first year in office, according to the Alaska Department of Labor.
Republican candidates minimizing their ties to an unpopular Trump as they head into a consequential election isn’t limited to Begich; it’s part of a broader trend among Congressional Republicans in tight races.
An Associated Press report last week found that Trump has recently vanished from several Republicans’ campaign websites. One dropped the pledge to be an “America First Fighter” in Trump’s service for “Independent Leadership” that’s focused on his state’s rising health costs. Another softened his branding, going from labeling himself as “President Trump’s wingman in Congress” to touting the need for “more servant leaders and fewer corrupt politicians.”
Begich’s own softening around Trump also made it into the article, which noted that the homepage of Begich’s campaign website went from highlighting his relationship with Trump in June—writing “Alongside President Trump, we have made great gains for Alaska, putting us on a path to self-determination and generational success”—to omitting Trump completely by the time of the primary election.
Now the site reads: “We have delivered for Alaska, putting us on a path to self-determination and generational success.”
Despite the subtle shifts in how Begich talks about Trump in public events, he’s been a diehard Trump supporter at closed-door events.
At a rally with House Speaker Mike Johnson last month, attendee Jeff Stetz said that the bipartisanship Begich has publicly touted was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Stetz called the rally a “sparsely attended group of sycophants” that focused largely on vilifying Democrats.
“It’s safe to say that neither of those party hardliners said anything in favor of cooperating across lines. Very much the opposite,” he said this week about the event. “The theme was that the only greater threat than communism is Democrats.”
Matt Acuña Buxton is a long-time political reporter who has written for the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and The Midnight Sun political blog. He also authors the daily politics newsletter, The Alaska Memo, and can frequently be found live-tweeting public meetings on Bluesky.
