With a month to go until Alaska’s Aug. 18 primary whittles the 17-candidate slate running to be Alaska’s next governor to just four, Sitka Democratic candidate Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins will be running with a fundraising haul that’s nearly double every other candidate save for the Republican who gave his own campaign $1.25 million.
According to reports filed with the Alaska Public Offices Commission, the 37-year-old former state representative has raised a whopping $1.8 million since his relatively late entrance into the race, accumulating two or three times as much as candidates who have been in the race and fundraising for far longer. And according to The Alaska Current’s analysis of the numbers, he can lay claim to both the highest number of unique contributors from Alaska as well as one of the highest concentrations of small-dollar contributions from Alaskans — about $223 per contribution.
“We’re thrilled and grateful for the surge of support we’ve received,” Kreiss-Tomkins said in a prepared statement. “Thank you to the 1,569 Alaskans from 67 communities in every corner of the state who have contributed to our campaign. … The reason for our campaign’s financial strength is simple: Alaskans want change.”
What isn’t mentioned in the news release, however, is that while he can cite several statistics indicating widespread grassroots support in the state, he also has a massive number of deep-pocketed Outside backers on his side.
While the largest contribution from an in-state donor is just $7,000, Kreiss-Tomkins’ out-of-state contributions include more than 40 five-figure contributions, with some of the largest contributions coming from employees of AI company Anthropic (that said, his platform does propose strict regulations on AI data centers and use). And even then, the vast majority of the Outside contributions come from small-dollar donors, from $1 to $500.
Still, those Outside contributions, taken together, dwarf the Alaska money he’s received. Meaning a little more than 20% of his $1.8 million haul came from Alaska addresses.
That makes Kreiss-Tomkins the candidate with the highest fraction of Outside funding of any candidate for governor — a distinction his critics have already seized upon — but in raw dollars he’s still near the front of the pack in terms of in-state fundraising.
Six candidates technically report more money coming from Alaska addresses, but four of those candidates are relying heavily on their own pocketbooks. Republican Matt Heilala, a podiatrist who rose to fame after pushing an anti-trans agenda on the state Medical Board, gave $1.25 million of his $1.5 million in-state haul. The same goes for Republican candidates Treg Taylor, who gave nearly $300,000 of his roughly $900,000 in-state haul, Adam Crum, who got about $335,000 of his $600,000 in-state haul from himself and family, and Shelley Hughes, who gave $175,000 of the $450,000 she’s raised in state.
Once you back out the money candidates have given to themselves, Kreiss-Tomkins’ in-state fundraising haul of $371,800 is the fourth-highest of any candidates, behind Democratic former state senator Tom Begich (about $1 million), Taylor (about $632,000) and moderate Republican former state senator Click Bishop ($553,000).
Begich’s $1 million in in-state contributions puts him at the top of the list for Alaska contributions, and he can credit that to about 1,600 individual Alaskan donors.
But unlike Kreiss-Tomkins’ reliance on small-dollar donors, a big chunk of Begich’s in-state haul comes from just a handful of deep-pocketed Alaskans, including attorney Robin Brena and Anchorage donor Justin Weaver, who has recently emerged as a key financial supporter of moderate and progressive candidates in Alaska. Taken together, the two men are reported to have given the Begich campaign $658,001, more than 60% of his total in-state haul.
As for in-state versus out-of-state contributions, the only other candidate, aside from Kreiss-Tomkins, to have less than 50% of their backing from Alaska addresses is the leading Republican candidate, Bernadette Wilson. About 47% of the $700,000 she’s raised comes from Alaska addresses, and while Kreiss-Tomkins has tapped into big-ticket Outside donors, Wilson has largely relied on a national conservative network of small-dollar donations.
According to our analysis, she’s collected more than 4,000 contributions, averaging about $125, from addresses outside Alaska.
By the numbers
| Candidate | Donors | AK Donors | Income | AK Income | Self | % from AK | AVG AK | AVG Outside |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins | 3092 | 1663 | $1,847,331 | $371,808 | 20.13% | $224 | $1,033 | |
| Matt Andrew Heilala | 409 | 299 | $1,582,107 | $1,542,539 | $1,250,000 | 97.50% | $5,159 | $360 |
| Tom Begich/Julia Hnilicka | 1887 | 1609 | $1,210,688 | $1,136,217 | 93.85% | $706 | $268 | |
| Treg Taylor/ Candice English | 312 | 223 | $1,029,417 | $929,247 | $296,902 | 90.27% | $4,167 | $1,126 |
| Adam Crum / Bob Craig | 341 | 244 | $789,091 | $606,094 | $333,257 | 76.81% | $2,484 | $1,887 |
| Bernadette M. Wilson / Michael K. Shower | 4027 | 1015 | $700,755 | $329,779 | 47.06% | $325 | $123 | |
| Click Bishop | 714 | 638 | $613,594 | $553,469 | 90.20% | $868 | $791 | |
| Shelley Hughes \ Blake Gettys | 273 | 255 | $463,595 | $457,952 | $175,000 | 98.78% | $1,796 | $314 |
| Dave Bronson / Josh Church | 544 | 464 | $390,749 | $319,696 | 81.82% | $689 | $888 | |
| Matt Claman | 358 | 301 | $293,822 | $166,272 | 56.59% | $552 | $2,238 | |
| Meda DeWitt / Christopher Steere | 209 | 185 | $113,246 | $104,813 | $104,813 | 92.55% | $567 | $351 |
| Bill / Randy Walker / Hoffbeck | 54 | 38 | $81,413 | $21,557 | $71,557 | 87.89% | $1,883 | $616 |
| Lesil McGuire/ Elizabeth Rexford | 48 | 29 | $38,508 | $24,323 | 63.16% | $839 | $747 | |
| Gregg B. Brelsford | 3 | 2 | $34,108 | $34,004 | 99.69% | $17,002 | $104 | |
| Edna DeVries | 93 | 88 | $33,079 | $31,624 | 95.60% | $359 | $291 | |
| NANCY A DAHLSTROM | 157 | 84 | $21,945 | $16,211 | 73.87% | $193 | $79 | |
| James William Parkin IV “JP4” / Ramadhani Greer “Ram” | 21 | 18 | $8,822 | $8,062 | 91.39% | $448 | $253 | |
| Bruce Walden | 2 | 2 | $2,341 | $2,341 | 100.00% | $1,170 |
Why it matters
The coming month is a make-or-break moment for the race to be Alaska’s next governor. Under Alaska’s open primary system, all 17 candidates will run against each other in an open primary with the top four finishers advancing to the general election. While the general election will be conducted with ranked-choice voting — the system that allows like-minded candidates to avoid automatically playing spoiler — voters will get only one chance in the primary, so there’s been little reason for campaigns to collaborate yet.
The results may also be a litmus test of sorts for campaigns assessing their shot of winning moving forward. Even if a candidate finishes in the top four, they could drop out if they fear that remaining on the ballot could hurt the chances of a like-minded candidate winning. Depending on the timing of their withdrawal, the state election officials could elevate the fifth-place finisher from the primary to the general election.
Also, these huge fundraising numbers are a good reminder that Alaska has no limits on contributions to candidates after a court struck down the state’s previous limits as too low. While the judge suggested that inflation-adjusted limits would pass legal muster, Republicans, under the direction of Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy, have routinely opposed any effort to reinstate campaign contribution limits.
Several lawmakers, like Christian National Homer Republican Rep. Sarah Vance, have argued against the limits, insisting that limiting political spending is limiting people’s right to free speech. Lawmakers passed such limits this year, but Dunleavy ultimately vetoed the bill in part because it would have affected this year’s election.
That said, voters will have the opportunity to reinstate such limits via a voter initiative in the November general election.
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.
