Targeting Conservative Terrain, Democrats Look to Independent Challengers in Alaska

Carl Hulse - September 12, 2020

PALMER, Alaska — Reaching into remote territory where they usually have little chance of victory, Democrats are mounting serious efforts to pick up Senate and House conservative-leaning seats here, reflecting rising hopes about their chances of winning control of the Senate and tightening their grip on the House.

And the party doesn’t even have candidates on the November ballot.

The candidates challenging incumbent Republicans, Senator Dan Sullivan and Representative Don Young, who is currently the longest-serving member of the House, are both running as independents. Their bids, once viewed as long shots, have become increasingly competitive in recent weeks, and are shaping up as crucial tests of whether a centrist label can overcome resistance to Democrats in a conservative-leaning state that has been rocked by the economic consequences of the coronavirus pandemic.

That steep downturn — and a grim national political environment for Republicans that has tracked with President Trump’s sagging approval ratings for much of the year — have helped put the challengers, Al Gross in the Senate contest and Alyse Galvin in the House fight, in striking distance of incumbents who were once considered safe. Those candidates say that, if elected, their lack of partisan allegiance will allow them to focus more on what is best for the state in a Congress in which there is rapidly dwindling tolerance for daylight between lawmakers and their parties on policy matters.

“I would say I am not a very good Democrat and I’m not a very good Republican,” said Dr. Gross, a former orthopedic surgeon and commercial fisherman who has not previously sought office but whose family has a political pedigree in Alaska. “Some of my values are in alignment with the Democratic Party and some are in alignment with the Republican Party. As a senator, I will always do what I think is best for the state, irrespective of partisanship.”