A curious change in Alaska’s official voter registration database has sparked questions about the party affiliation of US Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who has long had a complicated relationship with the Republican Party.
The confusion began when Alaska Public Media reporter Wesley Early tweeted a screenshot showing that Murkowski was registered as “Undeclared” in the Alaska voter registration system.
He later deleted the tweet after a staffer from Murkowski’s office contacted him, saying the senator was unaware of the change and insisted she is still a registered Republican.
But when contacted by this publication, the Alaska Division of Elections confirmed that Murkowski is, in fact, listed as “Undeclared” in their system, just as it was when the reporter accessed the information. Division officials acknowledged the discrepancy but could not provide an immediate explanation for how it was changed.
Update: Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher issued a statement: “The Division of Elections was notified on Thursday afternoon that the voter affiliation for Senator Lisa Murkowski was listed as ‘undeclared’. Upon further review, it was determined this was the result of a data entry error by a temporary worker in the August 2024 primary when the affiliation was left blank on her absentee ballot, and the worker mistakenly listed the Senator as undeclared instead of leaving her correct affiliation of Republican. The error has been corrected.”
There’s no record showing a party affiliation change, one official told us. When individuals apply for the Permanent Fund Dividend, their voter registration status is updated based on selections made during the PFD application process. But no such data shows that such a change was made.
State officials confirmed they are looking into the matter to determine how the change may have occurred, but as of Wednesday, they were just learning about the matter.
The incident has raised eyebrows, particularly given Murkowski’s increasingly strained standing within the Republican Party. She was censured by the Alaska Republican Party in 2021 following her vote to convict former President Donald Trump during his second impeachment trial and has faced criticism from the party’s main flank ever since.
Murkowski just launched her new book, “Far From Home,” a political memoir of her rise in politics. She has been interviewed widely in the media as part of the book launch, and will not rule out leaving the Republican Party and caucusing with Democrats.
The Division of Elections says it will investigate the situation to understand whether the change was due to a system error, a PFD-linked update, or another cause.
Until then, the episode remains another moment of political ambiguity for Alaska’s senior senator.
