According to the latest YouGov poll, Alaskans are the most interested citizens in America who would favor their state seceding from the United States.
Some 36% of Alaska residents would support the state divorcing the United States and becoming a fully independent nation. The average among all the states was 23%, which is a number that would be a bit lower if Alaska’s high percentage was removed from the average. Alaska is clearly an outlier in this poll.
YouGov surveyed 35,307 U.S. adults between February 2 and 5. The question was whether respondents would “support your state seceding from the U.S.”
Must Read Alaska is running a similar survey in its Monday newsletter, which can be found at this link. The survey is toward the bottom of the newsletter.
Following Alaska, the states with the highest percentage supporting their state’s secession were Texas at 31%, California at 29%, and New York and Oklahoma at 28%
On the lower end of the scale 13% of Minnesota respondents supported secession, and Ohio, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island were just above Minnesota at 14%.
About one-third of those polled (31%) told the pollster that states have a right to secede from the country, while 43% of respondents said there is no such right.
The respondents were split by party: Republicans and Independents were more closely divided on this question, while most Democrats reject the right to secession: 22% said there is such a right and 55% said there is not, YouGov reported.
Also, half of Democrats (49%) said they think of people who want their state to secede from the U.S. as “mostly traitors,” compared to 26% of Republicans who think that.
Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel using sample matching. A random sample (stratified by gender, age, race, education, geographic region, and voter registration) was selected from the 2019 American Community Survey. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, 2020 election turnout and presidential vote, baseline party identification, and current voter registration status. Demographic weighting targets came from the 2019 American Community Survey. Baseline party identification was weighted to the estimated distribution of last June, (34% Democratic, 31% Republican). The margin of error for the overall sample is approximately 3%, YouGov reported.
A tremendous amount of the money Alaska spends each year is from the federal government. Add the military and all the federal agencies that have large payrolls in the state and will cause a quickly failed state if you succeed from the union. Some things sound good if you incapable of thinking of the consequences.
So, better to remain a permanent welfare ward than to stand on our own two feet?
It’s called “kicking the habit”, Tom, and it is invariably good, if temporarily painful, for the addict in the long run.
It is better to be independent; it is far better to be self reliant; but most people prefer to stay on the government teat from birth to grave rather than make even minimal effort to break free. Sad but true. Just look at Anchorage assembly and the state senate buying votes with other people’s dollars.
Do you get Social Security, Medicare, or a PFD, or will you? Pretty sure we all know that answer.
I will never collect back what I paid into social security, not even counting what it might be worth had I invested. I was forced to sign up for Medicare in order to keep my insurance. It was not a choice and I resisted to try keeping my Cadillac plan (I failed-it’s the law). And the PFD belongs to the people of Alaska. Financially, I would greatly benefit giving it up and having mineral rights to the land under my feet. Want to trade? Don’t be a troll, strive for self reliance
AK, I totally agree with every part of your reply! I, too, would rather have my below-ground mineral and water rights returned to me instead of taking a permanent fund dividend that is being stolen from me and soon will be nothing.
What do you want to bet that the 1/3 are people who come to Alaska running from they’er problems in the lower 48, especially the south as these Cheechakos’ who hardly been here a week think they own the place, a few hard cold winters usually sends them back again, besides, its illegal to secede from the union, U.S. Armed forces will make sure secession does not happen 😉
3rd, you are wrong, it is fundamentally neither illegal nor unethical to seceded from a political entity. To claim otherwise is to support permanent tyranny.
The fact that one of the worst and most dishonorable presidents in US history, Abraham Lincoln, waged a horribly vicious, unnecessary and ILLEGAL war against the secessionist South proves nothing, other than that you feel that “might makes right”. What a lovely guiding principle.
What we are witnessing (esp. since 10/7) is the dividing of the right between rightist authoritarians and rightist libertarians.
I say good riddance to them. They seem to like the leftist authoritarians anyways (look how they work together for war). And they are often “rinos” (which is just another word for backstabber).
That is an interesting perspective, Micah, and you could well be correct. If so, as you say, it could only be a positive political development.
By your logic we are still “legally” part of the British Empire.
So we aren’t really questioning what some Alaskans are we are just haggling over the price?
Further, I would add that these blood monies received from the federal government have a corrupting influence on Alaskan character, ethics, and society. When I first moved here I was hoping to live among rugged individuals with the frontier spirit- and I found many of these Alaskans- and I also found many servile, unproductive people sucking on the government teet waiting around for others to tell them what to do and think.
There is a tremendous amount of federal money that comes into Alaska. And the regulations/political pressure & control that come with it.
But if people were willing to make the sacrifices, it could be possible. Alaska has a lot of resources tied up by the feds. I’m not saying it would be easy but possible. The US maintains bases in many countries by contract, in an amicable split.
The people who would remain would be those who really want to and were willing to make it work one way or the other.
Let’s see how the elections go. That will impact all this
Well said. And if Trump wins, there’s certainly no need to secede.
Dave, I agree in the short term it would be difficult for lack of federal funding. However we have tremendous resources, a small population and a permanent fund to tie us over. Oil and gas, coal, mining and timber companies are already here. The Jones’ Act would be no more. Alaska could be the major supplier for all.
While we are at it, let’s sell southeast to the Canadians, as that region is more aligned with them anyway and make Fairbanks the capitol…….
Tom
I would rather be free than have the government in the middle of my every move.
You go ahead and have big brother tell you what you can do and when and how much then you can get your cookie.
Tom – The tremendous amount of federal money that Alaska spends each year also comes with a tremendous amount of quality of life erosion!
Very interesting
Well then, I’d suggest that you all better start learning how to speak Russian.
So tell me why would Russia what more land with the same resources as land they already control. Land I might add that would be of considerable expense to maintain troops due to distance, very hostile and well armed Alaskans, and rugged terrian. Why not just develop Russian resources that are now far from capacity? Isn’t that far cheaper in treasure and blood for them?
You really didn’t think this through did you?
Putin would want it solely to threaten the US and the West, in the sane way that he’s doing it in Ukraine right now.
Just keep drinking that Kool-Aid…
How are you so sure what Putin wants?
You think the US and Canada would allow a Russian take-over of Alaska? I don’t.
Because Alaska is a lot tastier than the Ukraine…
Hey Hans, just a P.S. here, the Cold War has been over for more than 30 years.
You can put your threadworn and necon-induced Russophobia to rest now.
Funny, I can remember a time when it was the RIGHT-WINGERS who were the rabid warmongers, while the leftists advocated for diplomacy and peace. But that is only one part of the agenda that today’s so-called leftists have completely repudiated, in their quest to become and adopt exactly that which they formerly professed to loathe and oppose —- corporatism, censorship, oppression of dissent, warmongering foreign policy, centralization of all power, etc. etc. etc.
Yeah whatever. Alaskan secession is one of the stupidest ideas ever to emerge on this website. Like the UK leaving the EU, it wouldn’t take long for the cold hard reality of being alone to hit. Be careful what you wish for, because you might just get it.
Hans – You sound like a good little government apparichnik who is terrified of ever having to wean yourself off the public tit.
And Hans is not from alaska I just figured out.
Good call Doug.
35 years a resident and business contributor to the State, still with significant financial interests there.
Expect that number to rise after November.
Only if Trump loses.
I find that hard to believe. I’ve never met anyone who thought Alaska should be independent.
Just stay in your moms closet pepe
That’s the same logic behind the statement “I don’t understand how Trump won. I don’t know anyone who voted for him!”
This state would go into welfare withdrawal if we ever.split from the union.
Good we could get rid of some freeloaders.
That’s what reefer and ‘shrooms will do to ya.
Secession is a myopic viewpoint. What would a seceded Alaska do for currency and self-defense from belligerent entities. A seceded Alaska would become a prime target for Russia under the same pretense Russia is using for invading Ukraine. As it is now Alaska receives more from the federal government than it contributes. Good to recall that secession was done once before in 1861 and that didn’t work our very well for the southern states.
I guess Don Smith has never heard of ‘Foreign Aid’. Given the Strategic importance of Alaska in a geographical sense alone, the USA would be more than willing to dump trillions of Foreign Aid into Alaska.
A hostile and well armed population is nearly impossible to control. You can use brutal methods to extract some resources, but unless there is a cultural or religious tie it is not sustainable no matter who you are. So many examples, but let’s take the US v. the taiban. Twenty years of the most awesome, well funded military ever seen against a bunch of goat herders. And we know how that turned out.
As far as currency, there are many options. Why not use a multitude. Why be tied to one? Not having a federal reserve would be a positive game changer alone.
“……..A seceded Alaska would become a prime target for Russia under the same pretense Russia is using for invading Ukraine………”
The Russians literally ran out of food and gas in an invasion that extended a whole 600 miles by paved highway from Moscow. Don’t make me die laughing.
Don – The reason Russia invaded Ukraine was NATO’s eastward expansion and the Obama/Biden sponsored CIA’s bloody overthrow of the duly elected Ukrainian government in 2014. Putin has stated many times that Russia does not need anymore cold land!
I don’t see Alaska becoming an independent country, but I can certainly foresee us seceding from the USA and joining with other seceded states to become a reconstituted, non-woke, non-globalist nation in union with those other states.
Let the arrogant, intolerant and rabidly statist bicoastal parasites become the People’s Democratic Republic of Woke, and sink (farther) into dysfunction and chaos.
I can’t see secession. We’re too dependent on Federal bucks and too Californicated.
Such word salad.
Such much quislingism.
Much much quislingism and a strict follower of the narrative.
A loyal regime apparatchik to the bitter end.
I need to break out my thesaurus — a certain poster here is unhappy with my use of various synonyms for “traitor”, although I do try my best to shake it up. I can only apologize to him for the limited English vocabulary in this area.
Jeff,
Don’t worry, anyone who has read what you’ve written here over the years understands that English isn’t your first language.
(yawn)
We could succeed then apply for Foreign Aid and get a lot more Federal input of Billions of Dollars.
I doubt that would ‘succeed’.
If at first you don’t secede, try, try again.
The more that the government becomes more of a banana republic I would expect this number to climb.
The military would not go away in a succession. The US maintains bases in a number of places outside US borders. The geography and global position does not change if it became independent. Alaska would also be free to develop resource based trade/industry on the +/-97% of area currently controlled there feds.
Nope
We have become two peoples with no common values or ideology. We do not like each other. (Look in the comments section.) It already is one ruling and oppressing the other. We need to succeed with other states to avoid catastrophic violence or we need to loosen federalism radically. It will get far worse- and soon- if we are not proactive.
“We have become two peoples with no common values or ideology……..”
That is true locally, statewide, nationally, and internationally. Destroying continental unity only compounds our problems, and solves none. Is a Europe or Africa divided up into dozens of independent nations free of division? This “national divorce” BS is a whispered temptation to suicide. Nothing could be more suicidal.
The loosen federalism considerably.
Otherwise this pressure cooker is gonna blow.
“…….this pressure cooker is gonna blow……..”
“…….The people can not be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions it is a lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. We have had 13. states independant 11. years. There has been one rebellion. That comes to one rebellion in a century and a half for each state. What country before ever existed a century and half without a rebellion? And what country can preserve it’s liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it’s natural manure………”
That, too, as Jefferson noted, is inevitable. In Texas v White (1869) SCOTUS recognized only two ways that a state can secede. You appear to desire the revolt method. Okay. Go ahead. I’ll watch your blood water the tree of liberty.
Reggie, your myopic argument ignores and avoids the fact that the national “suicide” of which you speak IS HAPPENING RIGHT NOW!! When you only have one life preserver, and another hapless victim is trying to drag you under the water in the attempt to stay afloat, the only logical solution is to get away from that other victim, and allow them to drown, so that you might live.
The “national divorce” that you bemoan has ALREADY happened. It is time to face the facts, and to deal with them, rather than wallowing in some bygone illusion of unity.
Agree! A peaceful secession or even a partition would be the best for everyone’s interests.
You have allowed exposure to modern extreme media to twist your thought processes, Fire. Wake up.
And by “modern extreme media”, you are of course referring to the corrupt, corporate-controlled, pro-regime legacy media, right Hans? The official propaganda channels that pass as purveyors of “news”? The legion of fearmongering and warmongering pro-establishment parrots who masquerade as “journalists”?
THAT media?
Just STOP! These are just distractions from the problem.
Joe was right. If you don’t know what that means to Alaska history please go home now and leave Alaska alone.
Resurrect the AIP.
Agreed!
Sounds great in theory but could then end up back with Russia.
Nothing like trying to put a band-Aid on a bullet wound 😳
Or punch another, bigger bullet hole through oneself.
Join with Texas in an alliance based on energy production. They ha e a fair amount of military power also. LockMart builds planes in Ft Worth.
The survey proves that a lot of Americans are not critical thinkers.
Yep, about more than 2/3 of them.
Which is around the same proportion who foolishly and ignorantly were willing to submit to the corporate regime media’s fearmongering campaign and rolled-up their sleeves for the experimental and (then-)unproven mRNA clot shots.
Disablement and death, courtesy of Pfizer.
Jefferson, Your comment implies the shots for nanoparticle interference with mRNA function are now approved. I believe that is not yet the case.
Nathan, I agree with you, but in this case I was referring to it being unproven (at the time it was rolled out), not it being unapproved. But with all the evidence now at hand, it is beyond proven — proven to be unsafe, ineffective and dangerous.
I didn’t get surveyed did any of you?
Not me either
Like the Capital move, once you put a $ price tag people change their minds since we get about $7 back for every $1 spent
No it was the government who balked on moving the capital. It was not the people, and both times on the ballot it overwhelmingly passed by the public. Everyone cried that North Seattle would die without the government seat there. Alaska really dropped the ball when they could have bought the 80 acres and BP building at New Seward and Benson. The structure could hold both houses and staff, while still having raw land to develop. I reject your logic ans replace it with my own.
Why does this website choose to cite some random poll written by conservative British gentlemen in England or wherever they might be. Methinks a far better and more accurate polling question, and more relevant to the knowledge base of these two fellows might pertain to the odds on the length of King Chuckles reign in jolly old London, perhaps.
Most all 98% of our( 4 th generation Alaskan family ) would vote to secede in a heartbeat! I will call around to them to see if they were part of this Poll? It will be a waste of time with our daughter that works as an aid in the alaska education system! She is brainwashed! Liberty Ed
Wow. MAGA has even permeated your family relationships. Sad.
This is incredibly dangerous talk.
No, Reggie, it is sensible and necessary talk, in a time of incredibly dangerous and growing centralized power and tyranny.
Sensible to you, Jefferson, is patently irrational to most of the rest of us.
And by “us”, you are of course referring to all those conformists and spineless and hopeless moral and intellectual cowards who blindly and ignorantly still have faith and trust in the sociopathic globalists who rule over us and who are determined to kill most of us off under the rubric of “green energy” and “climate change mitigation” and “diversity” and “social justice”, right Hans?
Jefferson. You are tedious and cloying.
Paolo,
If I am “tedious and cloying”, it is only because the growing tyranny around the world to which I respond is relentless and deadly. One could also call it “cloying”, but that would be like saying a nuclear fireball is “toasty”.
Brought to us by a crooked government
If we could have our own nukes and control our immigration policies, it could work out OK.
I don’t buy it .
It’s an interesting thought experiment, a Constitutional Amendment would need to be ratified first as there currently is no constitutionally enumerated secession ability. I would suggest a mass of people would flee the state (new country) since there are so many federal jobs in Alaska, there would likely be a number of people who would move to the new country of Alaska. The new country of Alaska would likely end up with a population probably somewhere around the size of Iceland on a land mass about 17 times the size. In order to provide any form of government that could protect the borders and interests inside those borders every man, woman, and child would be conscripted into some form of government service. The new country of Alaska would need to somehow reimburse The United States for all the vast land holdings they currently have, this would likely bankrupt the new country of Alaska unless a deal were struck wherein the new country of Alaska served as a vassal state to The United States…but then we’d be right back in the boat we’re currently in but without a Permanent Fund and representatives to our Federal overlords.
Why am I not surprised that Steve-O is kneejerkedly against the idea of secession in the face of growing and democratically unresolvable tyranny, and throws in his support for centralized power and control?
Because he gets paid by them
They do, that’s news to me. How much do they pay me and who are they that are paying me? Better yet where is the money they are paying me with, I sure could use some of it.
I am increasingly suspecting that you are correct in that assessment, Mark.
His disinformational trolling seems far too clever, and far too skillful, to be simply the mistaken notions of a misguided individual.
Jeff,
You thinking I’m “far too clever” and “far too skillful” speaks volumes about you and your ability (or lack thereof) to process basic information.
Why am I not surprised that you’re for it, given that it is an irrational fantasy not based in reality. In other words, the fantasy world you live in.
“An irrational fantasy” like the breakup of the Communist bloc in the 1990s, or the American colonies breaking away from Great Britain, eh cman? THAT kind of irrationality?
Face it, in the 1770s, you would have been a diehard British loyalist, and fought AGAINST the colonials. You know it, and I know it, and everyone else here knows it.
Jeff,
It’s probably because you lack the ability to think critically, you can’t even come up with new words to insult those you disagree with let alone address the subject(s) being discussed. In short you offer nothing new, you have zero insight into any conversation, you simply repeat ad nauseum the empty rhetoric that has been provided to you by your masters.
Great projection again, Steve.
But your regular arrogance, your consistent dishonesty, and your malicious deceit out you for what you really are.
I have repeatedly pointed out the LIES, contradictions and disinformation in your Covidian pro-mRNA clot shot stance, and you have just as repeatedly danced around, ignored and evaded responding to ANY of those challenges. Why should I, or anyone here, take you seriously in that light?
Jeff,
You don’t point anything out, you don’t refute anything, what you do is repeat the same standard claptrap time and time again. You never offer any meaningful information to support the beliefs that are force fed to you and that you simply parrot for your masters, oh and insult those you disagree with…you do that, not well, but you do that. In all the years you’ve posted here you have yet to actually contribute one meaningful sentence to any conversation, and I’ve tried to time and time again to pull one out of you and somehow in the thousands of posts you’ve made you’ve managed to bring absolutely nothing to any conversation. Your stubborn persistence, while futile, is impressive.
(yawn)
Wow. I am so tired of people so wiling to consider the rules of orhers as a commandments for their lives.
First off, that there is or isn’t a right to secession was and is an argument that was once debated through invasion and force of arms. It was and isn’t dependent upon permission from a regulatory authority.
The right to part ways with the union of states was seen as implied and subtly approved during Federalist debates and initial ratification of the Constitution. Though not expressly stated.
That as the nation evolved and many of the fears of the Anti-Federalist were realized, it was frankly, too late for secession to succeed.
There is for one potential Federal precedent to support secession and that is how treaty rights are considered by Federal authority.
I’m assuming that you have some education, that you’re familiar with The Social Contract.
Alaska needs to either secede or surrender statehood.
More than 60% of our lands are under direct Federal authority, that’s more than all of Texas.
Under the current formulation, we have no representation, as well as any other small state, in the House.
No voice in the House means no importance to the executive. As long as the House contains over 400 instead of a realistic 200 or 250, we never will.
That the Federal government, through it’s tools of persuasion, further eroded the powers of the states by pushing for the passing of the 17th.
Let’s just call it for what it is. Either Americans need to be enfranchised again and proper powers returned to the states, or someone should just be honest and say “The Republic is Dead, Long Live the Empire.”
As for your statistics…history is filled with people that prefer to rule themselves and be poor rather than be ruled by outsiders.
17th,
My favorite excerpt for the preamble of the Declaration of Independence says:
“That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.”
Like I said, it’s an interesting thought experiment.
Splitting from the US would be the best thing for Alaska.
The current state of affairs in washington d.c., their endless wars, their endemic corruption, their treason toward American citizens, their destruction of our currency, their punishment of AK & HI with the reprehensible Jones act, their crippling of Alaska and the other western states with their punitive land grabs… I can go on and on.
We owe no loyalty to the US federal government because the federal government shows no loyalty to us. If Alaska became a nation, we’d be something like the 26th largest nation on earth by geographic area. We would be able to drill, refine and sell our own oil, natural gas and minerals. We would be able to eat cheap seafood, build with inexpensive lumber cut and milled in Alaska.
The US government thinks we owe it loyalty no matter how heinous it’s crimes against us and the rest of the world.
No. Loyalty must be deserved, must be earned and the US government abuses Americans, abuses veterans, and disgraces us across the entire globe.
This year, the DNC will steal another presidential election and demand we be grateful to them for their efforts or suffer the consequences.
The best thing we could do would be fire about 90% of the federal government employees, shut down every cabinet level bureaucracy and have the governors get together, see if they can figure out where it all went wrong.
That is unlikely to happen so what’s left? Peaceful secession. Or rebellion.
I remember when there was a lot of talk about Alaskan independence in the 1970s. I was all for it at first, but then decided that the talent pool in Alaska would be inadequate to run the place. I still believe that. As for the right to secede, we should have it, but I don’t think that we do. But here’s an interesting question, does the US have the right to evict states? I’d really like to get rid of a few.
Texas v White (1869)
I wish it would save the country a ton of money.
In a recent poll, 60% of Alaskans said they wanted to be dictator-for-life of the USA. The pollsters never published the results because they realized they were completely irrelevant to anything.
We can leave and annex the Yukon, Alberta, and Northern BC. Start our own country.
Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Think for yourselves.
So 1/3 of Alaskans are potential traitors. Let me guess they ar the 1/3 who get the most handouts from the feds. Useless poor welfare Conservatives.
Yes, rino, “traitors”. Just as were our Founding Fathers.
Opposition to tyranny is always branded as “treason” by quislings, cowards, and those who are hopelessly beholden to the powers-that-be.
It is actually those like you, shills and collaborators with corrupt authority, who are the real traitors. Traitors to their fellow countrymen, and traitors to liberty.
Project much??
What is starkly noticeable is that those states least in favor of secession are also the ones with either insignificant or no Federal presence or direct Federal management of their lands.
Essentially, typical Minnesotans. Ignorant folk unwilling to consider others’ priorities but certainly willing to push theirs on you.
“If you leave, you’ll never make it on your own.”
Classic sentence that every abuser uses.
All the comments from the leftist trolls on this article have just convinced me even more that democrats are literally born abusers.
The state incorporated in order to participate in Federal Revenue sharing and to get Block Grants. Which United States do they want to secede from, the Territorial United States of America Inc, the Municipal UNITED STATES INC, the US INC, the U.S. Inc., the USA Inc. or the actual unincorporated government of, for and by the people – The United States of America? All the corporations are foreign anyway – property of the Roman Curia. Actually, neither the Territorial State of Alaska Inc. nor the MUNICIPAL STATE OF ALASKA INC. can secede since they are mere franchises of the Territorial USA and the MUNICIPAL US.
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