The Haines Borough Planning Commission voted 5-1 on June 19 to recommend approval of an easement request by the Takshanuk Watershed Council, a nonprofit, that would allow the nonprofit to use a portion of the Jones Point Cemetery property — the only cemetery in Haines — for access to and fencing associated with a commercial composting facility.
The meeting drew strong opposition from the public, with dozens of residents filling the room and spilling into the entryway. Many residents voiced concerns about the impact of the project on the cemetery, while acknowledging support for composting in general. The primary concern centered on the use of cemetery land, which is protected by a 1922 deed restricting it to cemetery-related purposes.
The proposed easement includes construction of a 7-foot electrified wildlife barrier that would encroach on the cemetery parcel. Takshanuk Watershed Council, which owns approximately 50 acres of land nearby, including an old mill site, has been criticized for not locating the facility entirely on its own property.
Public testimony during the June 19 meeting lasted approximately 90 minutes. Residents expressed frustration that the nonprofit had already built an industrial structure before obtaining the required land use permit. TWC applied for an after-the-fact permit on Oct. 31, 2023, months after the structure was erected.
Some residents also raised concerns that the project, which involves composting organic waste, could attract wildlife and negatively impact the solemn and sacred character of the cemetery. Others argued that the project’s placement violates zoning regulations and deed restrictions.
Former Haines Mayor Jan Hill, speaking during public comment, cited the property’s historical significance and called on TWC to relocate the project to their own land. “Takshanuk has almost 50 acres,” Hill said. “We just want them to use their own property and leave our cemetery alone.”
During the meeting, Planning Commissioner Derek Poinsette recused himself from voting and presented the project as executive director of TWC. Poinsette told the commission that TWC had contacted the borough years earlier about the possibility of using the area, but admitted the organization was unsure of the exact location of the property line at the time of construction. He stated the project was built based on their understanding of historical use of the area.
Longtime resident Don Turner Jr. pushed back on that claim, referencing deed documents and maps that showed clear boundary lines. He pointed out that the structure was built close to the cemetery despite alternative options on the existing pad, and that the nonprofit failed to obtain a building permit beforehand. “They could have built 11 feet farther away,” Turner said during his testimony.
Zoning concerns were also highlighted, as the composting facility lies in a light industrial zone while the cemetery is located in a rural mixed-use zone. Borough code requires projects that span zoning districts to meet the requirements of the more restrictive zone, which would necessitate a conditional use permit process with public input — a step not yet completed.
Planning commissioners questioned TWC’s planning process, especially its failure to accurately determine property boundaries before beginning construction. When asked about possible errors in planning, Poinsette stated, “There were no errors, or anything made other than, like we said, we didn’t know exactly where that line was.”
Despite the range of concerns, the commission voted 5-1 in favor of recommending the easement to the Haines Borough Assembly.
The final decision will rest with the Assembly at its regular meeting on Tuesday, July 8. The public may submit written comments to the borough clerk at [email protected] until 5 pm on Monday. Public testimony will also be accepted in person and via Zoom. Details are available on the borough’s website under the July 8 Assembly meeting agenda.
A freshman Republican lawmaker from conservative District 28 in Wasilla is facing political backlash from within her own party after the district party leaders drafted a resolution to revoke their endorsement of her.
Rep. Elexie Moore has shown what they call a “consistent pattern” of opposition to the party’s core principles.
In a sharply worded resolution offered this week, the Republican district committee outlined a litany of grievances against Moore, including her votes on education funding and new tax-related legislation. The resolution also criticized her absence during a pivotal vote on a Permanent Fund dividend amendment, which resulted in a reduction to Alaskans’ dividends.
Moore, elected in 2024, is one of the Alaska House’s newest members. Her district committee’s decision to revoke support just 18 months into her term could have serious ramifications as she approaches her 2026 re-election campaign.
The resolution, titled “Resolution Revoking the Endorsement of Representative Elexie Moore,” argues that Moore has strayed from Republican orthodoxy by:
Voting for House Bill 57, which the district says dramatically increased education spending and mandated long-term tracking of high school graduates, a violation of Alaskans’ constitutional right to privacy.
Supporting Senate Bill 113, a revenue-contingent tax proposal nicknamed the “Etsy Tax,” which the district calls a “Democrat tax scheme” and an affront to the party platform’s anti-tax stance.
Missing a key vote on Amendment 1 to House Bill 53, which allowed Democrats to pass a cut to the PFD, a move the resolution frames as a betrayal of Republican values and Alaskan property rights.
Citing these and other actions, the resolution concludes:
“Representative Moore is hereby instructed to immediately remove any and all references to her endorsement by District 28 of the Alaska Republican Party from her campaign materials, websites, and social media platforms.”
In a lengthy Facebook post, Moore acknowledged receipt of the resolution via email and said she was “deeply heartbroken” by the decision. But she emphasized her commitment to transparency and thoughtful policymaking, even amid internal party disagreements.
“This resolution, driven merely by policy disagreements… painfully exposes the chasm in our party,” Moore wrote. “Without repair, that fracture will grow and ultimately inhibit the movement toward our common values.”
Moore defended her votes on HB 57 and SB 113, arguing that each decision was made with consultation, reflection, and the intention of balancing fiscal responsibility with community needs.
“These votes are not taken lightly,” Moore wrote. “They are made with the intention to move the needle and advocate for policies that strengthen Alaska in education, our finances, and individual liberties.”
She pledged to comply with the resolution and expressed gratitude for supporters who had remained in contact with her during what she called “the biggest learning curve of my life.”
Rep. Jubilee Underwood, another freshman legislator from neighboring District 27, came to Moore’s defense publicly, dismissing the resolution’s claims as exaggerated and constitutionally unfounded.
“Nothing in either of these bills or votes violate the Constitution,” Underwood wrote. “These are wild ‘whereas’ statements… I hope that a small group of people—who are refusing to have conversations with you—will talk to you.”
While the withdrawal of endorsement would carry no legal consequence, it signals possible vulnerability for Moore in what could be a heated primary season in 2026. For now, it’s clear she will not be invited to district Republican functions, will not receive funding or volunteer support from the district, and will likely face a Republican who will be recruited by the party to challenge her in 2026.
On Moore’s extended Facebook post, several of her fellow Republican lawmakers added “caring” emojis, including Rep. Jeremy Bynum, Rep. Will Stapp, Rep. Jubilee Underwood, and Rep. Julie Coulombe. Also adding a supportive emoji was Scott Kendall, the political attorney and author of Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system.
In the 2024 Alaska House of Representatives election for District 28, Elexie Moore (Republican) defeated Steve Menard (Republican) in a ranked-choice voting election. After the recount, Moore won by a margin of 9 votes, with Moore receiving 3,243 votes and Menard receiving 3,234 votes after the redistribution of second-choice votes from third-place candidate Jessica Wright.
South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster moved to sever Medicaid funding from Planned Parenthood in 2018. He was immediately met with a lawsuit from a patient who cited a provision in Medicaid that allows consumers to select their own provider.
The McMaster administration argued that such lawsuits undermine the concept of state sovereignty by effectively placing decision-making power in the hands of plaintiff attorneys.
In the spring, the Supreme Court announced that it would hear Medina v. Planned Parenthood. After seven years, it has just ruled in favor of South Carolina with a 6-3 opinion divided along ideological lines.
The decision is a major win for McMaster with national implications.
“The U.S. Supreme Court absolutely got the issues right in Medina,” Attorney General Treg Taylor told Must Read Alaska. “This is a big win for states’ rights and a big loss for plaintiffs’ attorneys.”
Other states are likely to emulate South Carolina’s approach and cut off Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood.
Critics of the court’s decision argued that patients will now be deprived of the ability to choose their providers, with little recourse after the fact. Indeed, the matter at the heart of the case was whether provider choice constitutes a kind of enforceable individual right.
It’s a debate as old as the freedom-of-choice provision, which was added to the Medicaid statute in 1967.
Congress introduced the provision amid growing concerns of provider favoritism, in which some states were attempting to essentially funnel Medicaid enrollees to select public hospitals and clinics. However, the exact meaning of the provision has always been ambiguous.
Lawsuits, like Medina v. Planned Parenthood, have been grounded in the interpretation of the provision as granting an individual right.
That is why many attempts by states to strip Planned Parenthood of Medicaid dollars have been met with armies of plaintiff attorneys. Justice Elena Kagan, one of the dissenting liberals, argued that the provision “does the same thing that the ‘rights’ languages does,” and therefore confers individual rights.
Justice Neil Gorsuch disagreed.
“Deciding whether to permit private enforcement poses delicate policy questions involving competing costs and benefits—decisions for elected representatives, not judges,” Gorsuch wrote.
If, as Gorsuch believes, the provision is merely a general directive, then states are well within their rights to strip Planned Parenthood of this funding, with discretion reserved for the Department of Health and Human Services. South Carolina pointed to lower court decisions in Texas that ruled as much.
In practical terms, the Supreme Court’s decision puts the ball back in the court of state legislatures, where Taylor says it belongs.
“States should be able to decide important policy issues surrounding the implementation of federal law, like should state Medicaid fund Planned Parenthood, without facing expensive litigation by anyone who disagrees with that policy choice.”
The left has declared war on those who would place work or service requirements on those who receive Medicaid and are able-bodied.
The statements made against any who support the work or service requirement are powerful and clear. You are killing people. You are taking away the way of life of Alaskans. You are stealing folks’ healthcare. Let’s review each of these claims and then look at the idea of an able-bodied person receiving a permanent benefit from the view of our declaration of independence and from our religious and moral duty to the poor.
Let’s look at these claims: First: “You are killing people.”
Those who have regular employment live longer than those who do not have regular employment.
Unemployed individuals have a 63% higher risk of death compared to employed peers—after adjusting for confounders.
Employment can lead to an increase in life expectancy of up to 10 years, depending on race, gender, and age.
How about: “It is a way of life for Alaskans to be on Medicaid and requiring work or public service is taking away that lifestyle.”
In Alaska, a strong majority of Medicaid adults are already working. According to a recent KFF state fact sheet:
In Alaska 72% of adult Medicaid recipients are employed:
49% full-time
23% part-time
Only 28% are not working.
How about: “You are stealing up to 1/3 of Alaska’s healthcare”
While 32% of Alaskans are on Medicaid, very few are threatened by the work or public service requirements in the BBB.
That means that 2.6% of Alaskans will have to either get work, look for work, get training, or perform some kind of public service to receive the benefit. Not 1/3, but less than 1/33rd.
Now to the real question for Alaska and for the US which has to do with our national vision when founded, and whether it is right to ensure able-bodied people earn what they get in life in some way.
From the view of an American citizen: If we are given something, are we not beholden to that system, do we not organize our life around the requirements of that ‘ruler’? Do we want to have Medicaid as our ‘King’? A couple phrases from our declaration of independence shed some light on the founding principle of America:
“Give me liberty or give me death.”
“That all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…”
“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”
The themes of the declaration reveal our ultimate goals of individual liberty, moral agency, and the duty to act against injustice.
Is it an injustice to require work or public service for the able-bodied? I will close with this thought from Thomas Aquinas, a Catholic Saint, one of the wisest and most thoughtful people ever born:
“For nothing is more foolish than that in this present life, where men ought so to work that they may live eternally, men should live in idleness. It is great folly to live in idleness in this life; because from idleness, as from an evil teacher, we learn evil knowledge; because through idleness we come to lose the good that lasts forever; because through the short idleness of this life we incur a labor that is eternal.”
As always, Aquinas settles the issue and places the Medicaid war as a struggle between good and evil. When you hear Facebook and YouTube ads telling us that a person must persist in their idleness but still receive goods from the State, you can know that this is the eternal play of good and evil. It is good to require public service or work for society, but especially for the able-bodied recipient of Medicaid.
Glen Biegel is a technology security professional, Catholic father of nine, husband to a saint, and politically active conservative.
The newly signed One Big Beautiful Bill that President Donald Trump signed into law on Independence Day is reshaping the federal tax landscape with tax relief for individuals, families, and businesses.
The measure makes permanent and expands many provisions from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, while rolling back green energy tax breaks and offering new targeted deductions.
Many of these tax cuts may have the effect of stimulating the economy, although analysts also estimate it will drive national debt higher, as the government will be foregoing trillions in tax remittances from American workers. That may be offset by economic growth.
The One Big Beautiful Bill is projected to deliver substantial after-tax income gains for most Americans, with middle-income households seeing the biggest boosts, according to economic estimates released this week.
An analysis by the Tax Foundation shows that the bill will increase after-tax income by 2.9% in 2025, rising to 5.4% in 2026 as the continuation of individual tax cuts from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) takes full effect.
By 2034, the overall impact of the legislation on market income will moderate to 2.8% income retention due to the expiration of some temporary provisions. However, when accounting for increased economic growth from permanent measures—such as full expensing for equipment and research and development—market incomes are expected to rise 3.6% on a dynamic basis.
Middle-income earners are poised to benefit most in the near term, especially in 2026, thanks to the extension of TCJA provisions and new targeted tax relief for seniors, overtime workers, and employees in tipped industries.
On balance, most taxpayers will experience measurable income growth, especially during the years when the individual tax cuts are most fully in force.
Here’s a breakdown of the major tax changes included in the law:
Individual Tax Relief
Bracket Adjustments and Standard Deduction Enhancements:
The bill makes permanent the lower tax rates first enacted under the expiring Trump tax cuts in 2017, with inflation adjustments extended by an extra year for the 10%, 12%, and 22% brackets.
The standard deduction is enhanced, starting in 2025 at $31,500 for joint filers, $23,625 for heads of household, and $15,750 for others, with annual inflation adjustments.
Child and Senior Tax Benefits:
The child tax credit is now permanently set at a higher maximum of $2,200 in 2026, indexed to inflation.
A new senior deduction of $6,000 per qualifying individual will be available from 2025 through 2028. It applies to both itemizers and non-itemizers, phasing out at $75,000 in modified adjusted gross income.
Mortgage and SALT Deductions:
The $750,000 cap on mortgage interest deductions is made permanent.
The cap on state and local tax (SALT) deductions temporarily rises to $40,000 in 2025 and will increase 1% per year through 2029, before dropping to a flat $10,000 in 2030. A phaseout begins for incomes above $500,000.
Other Individual Provisions:
Several itemized deduction limits are locked in, including the end of miscellaneous deductions (except for educators), and restrictions on personal casualty losses and moving expenses.
A cap is introduced: taxpayers in the top bracket can only deduct 35 cents per dollar of itemized deductions.
A permanent $1,000 ($2,000 for joint filers) above-the-line charitable deduction is created, alongside a new 0.5% floor on itemized charitable deductions.
The Alternative Minimum Tax exemption increase is made permanent, and the phaseout thresholds revert to 2018 levels.
Temporary Individual Deductions (2025–2028):
Up to $25,000 of tip income becomes deductible for workers in traditionally tipped industries.
Overtime pay deductions of up to $12,500 ($25,000 for joint filers) are allowed, phasing out at higher incomes.
Interest on U.S.-made auto loans can be deducted up to $10,000, with income-based phaseouts.
Estate Tax Reform
Starting in 2026, the estate and lifetime gift tax exemption doubles to $15 million for individuals and $30 million for couples, indexed to inflation.
Business Tax Reforms
Incentives for Investment and Innovation:
Businesses can now permanently expense domestic research and development costs. Small businesses with under $31 million in gross receipts can retroactively expense R&D back to 2021.
Immediate expensing is restored for short-lived assets, and 100% bonus depreciation is reinstated.
A temporary provision allows 100% expensing of qualifying building structures through 2029.
Pass-Through Entities and Interest Deductions:
The 20% pass-through deduction (Section 199A) becomes permanent, with expanded income thresholds and a $400 minimum deduction for qualified small business income.
The EBITDA-based limit on net interest deductions is restored permanently. (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization.)
Corporate Charitable Giving and Green Energy Rollbacks:
A 1% floor for corporate charitable contribution deductions.
Several Inflation Reduction Act tax credits are repealed or scaled back, including clean electricity credits (45Y and 48E) are eliminated for projects placed in service after 2027, except for nuclear, hydropower, geothermal, and battery storage.
The clean hydrogen credit ends after 2027.
The energy-efficient commercial buildings deduction is repealed.
The clean fuel production credit is extended through 2030 with expanded eligibility.
New restrictions targeting “foreign entities of concern” are placed on energy credits including those for wind, solar, hydrogen, and nuclear.
Publicly traded partnerships can now include income from hydrogen storage, carbon capture, and other clean power sources in their qualifying income calculations.
In 1776, a 38-year-old monarch ruled the world’s largest empire. King George III, a one-world globalist by today’s standards, believed sovereignty rested with the crown. He imposed this tyranny with a familiar list of offenses: a rigged justice system, martial law, political persecution, and incitement of domestic unrest. The people he ruled, our forebears, stood up and said no.
Those men, many of them preachers, farmers, shopkeepers, and scholars, did not have titles or armies behind them. What they had was conviction, courage, and a belief that rights come not from kings, but from our Creator. Among those rights, in fact the very first listed, was the right to life. Without the right to life, no other right – liberty, property, or the pursuit of happiness – can exist. The founders placed life first because it is the sacred gift from which all freedom flows, a truth that compels us to protect every human life, born and unborn.
The Declaration of Independence is not just a historical document. It is a moral contract between “We the People.” The founders appealed to the Supreme Judge of the World because they believed the fight for liberty was not only political, but supremely spiritual. They understood that no government has the authority to take what God has given: not life, not liberty, and not the pursuit of happiness.
They pledged their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. And they paid dearly. Eleven signers of the Declaration lost their homes. Five were captured. Nine died during the war. Seventeen served in combat. These men were not chasing glory; they were Cathedral Builders, laboring selflessly to construct a nation that would stand as a beacon of freedom for generations to come. Benjamin Franklin said, “We must all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.” He was not being poetic. He was being brutally honest.
Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1774, ‘The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them.’ This truth—that life and liberty are inseparable divine gifts—formed the heart of the Declaration, compelling us to defend every human life, born and unborn, as the foundation of all rights.”
John Adams, writing to his wife Abigail in 1776, foresaw the cost of freedom: “I am well aware of the toil and blood and treasure it will cost us to maintain this Declaration… Yet through all the gloom I can see the rays of ravishing light and glory.” His vision of hope through sacrifice reminds us that defending life and liberty requires unwavering resolve, just as it did then. The founders fought to protect the vulnerable from tyranny’s grasp. If we fail to defend the lives of the most vulnerable of all, the unborn, we betray the very reason this nation was founded.
This means supporting policies, organizations, and communities that protect life from conception, ensuring that every child is given the chance to live and thrive as the founders intended.
We hear much these days about rights, reproductive rights, privacy rights, health care rights, but we hear little about responsibility. The Greek word for citizen is “πολίτης” (polítis), which means co-ruler, co-king. That is your role in a Republic, someone entrusted to guard the rights and liberties of your neighbor just as firmly as your own. We don’t outsource indivisible freedom. We steward it.
Daniel Webster warned that miracles do not cluster. What happened once in six thousand years, he said, may never happen again. “Hold on to the Constitution,” he urged, “for if it should fail, there will be anarchy throughout the world.” He was right. The Constitution is not just ink on parchment; it is the last firewall against tyranny.
President Donald Trump said it well in 2020: “Make no mistake. The left-wing cultural revolution is designed to overthrow the American Revolution.” There are those who seek not justice or equality, but power. In that pursuit, some would erase history, silence debate, undermine the sanctity of life, and dismantle the freedoms that lifted billions out of poverty and oppression.
But we will not bow or kneel to that agenda. We kneel only to Almighty God.
We believe in free speech, not speech codes. We believe in equal justice under law, not two-tiered enforcement. We believe that every person, of every color and creed, is made in the holy image of God, and that includes the unborn.
John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, wrote that the Revolution was marked by such divine favor that future generations might be tempted to dismiss it as a myth. It was not a myth. It was a miracle.
John Adams saw the birth of this nation as part of a grand design for the emancipation of mankind. If we are to honor that design, we must defend the rights it was built upon, especially the right to life, from conception to natural death.
We celebrated Independence Day yesterday, not just with parades and fireworks, but with resolve. A Republic means the people are king, ruling through their representatives. That is a tremendous responsibility. It means that “We, The People,” must protect our marvelous inheritance. As Senator Henry Cabot Lodge said in 1919, “Beware how you trifle with it, for if we stumble and fall, freedom and civilization everywhere will go down in ruin.”
So today, as we stand on the shoulders of giants, let each of us recommit to the-cause they bled for: defending the sacred dignity of all human life, born and unborn, upholding the rule of law, and ensuring a government that serves rather than rules. Let us protect the unborn, honor the Constitution, and never forget that liberty requires constant vigilance.
We stand on the shoulders of giants. Let us build a nation worthy of their legacy.
Rep. Kevin McCabe serves in the Legislature on behalf of District 30, Big Lake.
The State of Alaska now faces a pivotal decision that will define its financial trajectory and societal integrity for decades. Since the administrative expansion of Medicaid in 2015, the state has been weighed down by unsustainable costs, an enlarged bureaucratic apparatus, and deepening dependence on federal systems that undermine local governance.
Recent developments, including a carve-out by Sen. Lisa Murkowski exempting Alaska from new federal Medicaid work requirements, have only further entrenched this dependency, shielding able-bodied adults from the very accountability measures that foster economic participation. To protect its fiscal health and constitutional order, Alaska must act decisively to reverse Medicaid expansion and reclaim control over its future.
Legal Authority:
Clear, tested, and available under the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in NFIB v. Sebelius (2012), Medicaid expansion is strictly optional.
States can join or exit at will without penalty to their traditional Medicaid programs.
Alaska’s Medicaid expansion was implemented solely by Governor Bill Walker in 2015 through informal administrative action. This action was without legislative approval or the issuance of an executive or administrative order. While a 2016 Alaska Superior Court decision upheld the legality of the expansion under federal law, the Alaska Supreme Court has never ruled on the constitutional question of whether a governor may unilaterally commit the state to long-term fiscal obligations without a legislative appropriation.
Given that the expansion was executive in origin, it can be reversed the same way. The Governor of Alaska, Michael J Dunleavy, in Trump like fashion, must take the following procedural steps to return Medicaid expansion responsibilities to the federal government:
Step 1: Policy Determination and Legal Review Initiate an internal legal review confirming that the reversal of the Medicaid expansion is compliant with NFIB v. Sebelius and aligned with federal Medicaid guidelines.
Step 2: Draft a Revised State Plan Amendment Instruct the Alaska Department of Health to draft a revised SPA to formally withdraw the expansion population (an estimated 40,000 to 60,000 able-bodied adults) from state Medicaid coverage.
Step 3: Submit Revised SPA to CMS Submit the revised SPA to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) with a formal letter from the Governor stating Alaska’s intention to end Medicaid expansion and outlining the transition plan.
Step 4: Coordinate Transition with CMS Work with CMS to ensure that affected individuals are transitioned to appropriate federal fallback programs such as ACA marketplace subsidies.
Step 5: Restructure State Medicaid Programs and Personnel Begin the downsizing and restructuring of administrative divisions within the Department of Health, DCCED, Division of Health Care Services, and Office of Children’s Services to reflect reduced coverage and compliance requirements.
Step 6: Public Communication and Legislative Notification Communicate the rationale, process, and benefits of the reversal to the public and the Alaska Legislature to build transparency and support.
Step 7: Monitor Legal and Political Developments Prepare for potential legal or political challenges from interest groups invested in expansion dollars and ensure a robust defense of the executive authority to act.
Fiscal Ramifications: Real Savings, Lasting Impact Long-Term Forecast of Medicaid Enrollment and Spending in Alaska:
FY2024-FY2044, February 16, 2024, by Evergreen Economics, Page 6, states Alaska’s Medicaid costs are escalating rapidly, with general fund obligations increasing by nearly 5% annually. Left unchecked, these costs are projected to exceed $1.7 billion by FY2044.
Reversing this expansion will:
• Eliminate the 10% match requirement for the expansion population, saving hundreds of millions over time;
• Reduce overhead by downsizing redundant layers of administrative bureaucracy in agencies like the Department of Health, Division of Health Care Services, and Office of Children’s Services;
• Simplify Medicaid management, making room for more effective delivery of care to the truly vulnerable—Alaska’s children, elderly, and disabled, not able-bodied adults;
• Insulate the state from future volatility in federal policy, such as reductions in match rates or block grant conversions.
These savings are not theoretical. They are calculable, practical, and necessary for stabilizing Alaska’s long-term budget and restoring fiscal sovereignty.
The Political Ramifications: Resistance from the Dependent Class
This reform will face intense opposition. It will come not from the public at large, but from institutional beneficiaries of the status quo.
• Public health bureaucracies, tribal health consortia, large hospital systems like Providence and ANTHC, and public-sector unions have developed entire ecosystems around the federal dollars tied to Medicaid expansion. Their resistance will be fierce, driven by the threat to their funding, power, and jobs.
• Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s exemption for Alaska from the new national Medicaid work requirements, as included in the so-called “Big Beautiful Bill,” is a textbook case of political dependency management. Rather than requiring able-bodied Alaskans to work, seek employment, or contribute through volunteering, as every other state must, Alaska’s Medicaid population is now protected from such responsibilities.
This move deepens the dependency trap and sends a demoralizing message: that Alaskans are less capable than their peers across the country. It treats the expansion population not as citizens to be empowered, but as wards to be managed.
Gov. Dunleavy can not only lawfully reverse Medicaid expansion but also pivot politically by tying that action to a practical, dignity-centered initiative that gets able-bodied Alaskans off Medicaid and into the workforce.
What Was Promised and What Was Delivered
Internal marketing documents promoting Medicaid expansion in 2013 painted a glowing picture: increased access, improved outcomes, and a booming economy. But the outcomes failed to meet expectations:
• In the October 2013 “Medicaid Expansion Marketing Paper”, Valarie Davidson, then Senior Director of Legal & Intergovernmental Affairs at the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium and later Commissioner of Health and Social Services under Governor Walker, promised that Medicaid expansion would bring job growth, improved care, and budget relief. In practice, however, Alaska’s healthcare system has become more costly, more bureaucratic, and increasingly disconnected from local control.
• Administrative layers have multiplied, not shrunk. Emergency care remains overburdened. Preventable chronic diseases persist. The Alaska Department of Health has become a bloated compliance machine, while rural and mental health needs go unmet.
The expansion did not reform the system, it fed it. And now, reform cannot occur without dismantling the very framework built around this failed expansion.
The short-term financial gain for Alaska’s variety of health care providers comes at the expense of long-term fiscal sustainability and personal accountability. Healthy Medicaid recipients may receive minimal care, but their existence in the system sustains a bloated structure that grows government, stifles local innovation, and cements dependency, both socially and economically. Reversing this trend would restore incentives to work, refocus care on the truly vulnerable, and rebalance the system toward freedom and responsibility.
A New Path Forward: Freedom Over Dependency Reversing
Medicaid expansion reversal is more than a budget cut. It is a philosophical return to Alaska’s roots of self-reliance and local control. It would:
• Restore constitutional checks by returning such a sweeping fiscal policy to legislative and public oversight;
• Redirect funds to front-line care, mental health support, and rural medical innovation;
• Reduce bureaucratic sprawl, allowing community-centered care to emerge in response to real local needs;
• Reclaim Alaska’s identity as a place of freedom, not a managed zone of compliance.
This reform will send a national message: Alaska chooses sovereignty over submission, productivity over passive entitlements, and governance over government dependency.
Conclusion: A Test of Leadership and Resolve
Gov. Mike Dunleavy has both the legal right and the moral duty to reverse Medicaid expansion. While political forces aligned with Medicaid dollars will rage, this decision offers a path to financial stability, empowered citizens, and meaningful healthcare reform.
Sen. Murkowski’s actions may shield the Medicaid bureaucracy from reform, but they cannot shield Alaskans from the consequences: rising debt, declining services, and eroded independence.
The question is no longer whether Alaska can reverse Medicaid expansion. It is whether Alaska’s leaders will. The choice is between deepening the dependency cycle or breaking it, between protecting bureaucracies or protecting Alaskans.
For the sake of Alaska’s future, Gov. Dunleavy, the answer must be clear.
US. Senator Dan Sullivan explained his vote in favor of the sweeping One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025, calling it a historic legislative victory for Alaska that delivers major advancements in energy development, tax relief, military investment, border security, health care, and more.
Sullivan said the legislation, the product of months of negotiations, includes provisions that prioritize Alaska and will benefit the state for generations. “No state fared better from this bill,” he said, pointing to the law’s broad scope and targeted focus on unlocking Alaska’s economic and strategic potential.
The bill includes mandates for extensive energy leasing across Alaska’s resource-rich lands. It requires:
At least four new area-wide lease sales in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) over the next decade,
Resumption of at least five lease sales in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A),
A minimum of six lease sales over 10 years in Cook Inlet.
The legislation restores leasing frameworks from the first Trump administration and increases the state’s share of resource revenue to 70 percent for future leases. This is less than the 90% for Alaska that was first proposed in the bill by Rep. Nick Begich, but is far higher than the current state share of 50%.
It also streamlines federal environmental reviews by enabling project sponsors to opt into expedited timelines through a fee-based system.
Additionally, the bill encourages increased timber harvests and long-term logging contracts on federal lands, including the Tongass National Forest, and creates an Energy Dominance Financing program to support major projects such as Alaska LNG.
The bill locks in permanent lower tax rates and averts what would have been a $4 trillion tax increase. It enhances the Child Tax Credit, expands the standard deduction used by over 90 percent of taxpayers, strengthens the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit, and maintains small business deductions that promote local economic growth.
Sullivan, who chairs the Commerce Subcommittee overseeing the U.S. Coast Guard, secured nearly $25 billion in funding for the service—the largest investment in its history. This includes funding for 16 new icebreakers and $300 million to homeport the Coast Guard icebreaker Storis in Juneau.
The bill also advances the Golden Dome initiative, bolstering homeland missile defense with new interceptors, sensors, and radar—centered in Alaska—and promotes redevelopment of Arctic infrastructure such as the Adak Naval Base.
The legislation includes what Sullivan called the most robust border enforcement package in a generation. It allocates $46 billion for physical border barriers, boosts funding for Border Patrol and law enforcement, and enhances efforts to stop the flow of fentanyl, including in Alaska.
Sullivan said the bill will direct approximately $200 million annually for five years toward modernizing Alaska’s health care system. The funding aims to stabilize rural health providers, improve outcomes, and preserve access to care in underserved communities.
The law also introduces new work requirements for Medicaid and SNAP benefits, with flexibility granted to Alaska to accommodate the state’s unique challenges. These changes are designed to preserve benefits for the truly vulnerable, including single parents and individuals with disabilities or mental illness.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025:
Requires BLM to hold at least 4 additional area-wide ANWR lease sales in the Coastal Plain over the next 10 years, with revenues divided 70 percent for the State of Alaska and 30 percent for the federal government starting in 2034—up from 50 percent;
Requires the Secretary of the Interior to expeditiously restore and resume lease sales under the NPR–A oil and gas program as directed by federal law—5 lease sales within 10 years of enactment under terms, conditions, stipulations, and areas described in the first Trump administration’s 2020 NPR-A Integrated Activity Plan and Final Environmental Impact Statement and Record of Decision—and directs that the State of Alaska receive 70 percent of revenues generated from development activity on future leases starting in 2034–up from 50 percent;
Requires a minimum of six lease sales over 10 years in Cook Inlet, with at least 1 million acres per sale and with revenues divided 70 percent for the State of Alaska and 30 percent for the federal government starting in 2034—up from 27 percent;
Reverses the Biden-era royalty hike by reinstating a lower 12.5-16.67 percent on offshore and onshore federal oil and gas leases;
Restores commonsense leasing rules that we saw under the first Trump administration that are a prerequisite to generating federal revenues from production in both the NPR-A and in ANWR—more lands, more leasing on a more prescriptive timeline;
Streamlines the NEPA environmental review process by allowing project sponsors to opt in for faster timelines through a fee-based system, halving review periods;
Includes a $5 billion increase for critical minerals supply chains, opening new opportunities for Alaska’s mining industry;
Requires increased timber harvests and long-term contracts in national forests and public lands, including in the Tongass National Forest;
Creates a new Energy Dominance Financing program within the Department of Energy to support enhancement and development of reliable energy infrastructure, providing another vehicle for the Alaska LNG project to accelerate development of the gasline;
Places a 10-year moratorium on the methane tax; and
Provides $1 billion for the Defense Production Act to conduct critical mineral mining operations, including in Alaska.
In tax relief, the bill:
Avoids a massive $4.5 trillion tax increase on Americans by extending the 2017 tax cuts;
Institutes a permanent $2,200 child tax credit and tax relief amounting to an estimated annual take-home pay increase of $7,600-$10,900 for a family of four;
Expands tax credits to make child care more affordable for the thousands of working families in Alaska that are in need of quality, affordable child care:
Specifically, this bill enhances the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit, the only tax credit that specifically helps working parents offset the cost of child care. This provision builds on stand-alone legislation that Sen. Sullivan cosponsored;
Improves the Employer-Provided Child Care Credit which supports businesses that want to help locate or provide child care for employees;
Expands the Dependent Care Assistance Plan which creates flexible spending accounts that allow working parents to set aside pre-tax dollars to pay for child care expenses;
Eliminates taxes on tips and overtime for millions of workers, and taxes on auto loan interest for new American-made vehicles;
Expands tax relief for small businesses, which constitute 99.1 percent of businesses in Alaska, benefiting the backbone of Alaska’s economy; and
Makes permanent the opportunity zone, low-income housing, and new markets tax credits—key incentives for economic development and affordable housing, and adds greater emphasis on economically disadvantaged and rural areas.
Sen. Sullivan described the final package as the result of months of “relentless, focused work on behalf of Alaskans—and it delivers significant wins for our state.”
One of the impacts of the Great Big Beautiful Bill is the ability of low- and middle-income families to be able to afford private school.
The bill allows taxpayers to take a tax credit of $1,700/year and send it to a Scholarship Granting Organization (SGO) to fund private school scholarships, instead of sending that money to the federal government.
The SGO’s would be able to offer scholarships to kids from families that are below 300% of the median family income in each area. That income level in Anchorage would be roughly $290,000/year– but would vary by the local median income, for a statewide average of about $270,000 in income to qualify for a scholarship.
The impact could be huge. If one quarter of the federal taxpayers in Alaska took the $1,700 credit sending that money to an SGO instead of the federal government, that would result in $137 million going to the SGO’s, or enough to fund 19,600 scholarships of $7,000 each. A large portion of the current 5,080 private school students in Alaska would likely be eligible to receive a scholarship. In addition, 15,000 new students would be able to get a scholarship at that level.
If the parents of 15,000 students in traditional public neighborhood schools thought an affordable private school was a better fit for their kids and moved over, it would save $213 million/year in formula funding expense for the state of Alaska. That’s $213 million/year that wouldn’t needed to be diverted away from PFD’s.
This would certainly foster an environment of healthy competition that would provide our public schools a much need spur to innovate and improve parent satisfaction to avoid losing more students and having to manage the fixed cost and infrastructure problems associated with rapidly declining enrollment.
In the end it’s a win-win. Parents have more choices and traditional schools are motivated to innovate and improve the quality of their programs to keep parents interested.
Bob Griffin is on the board of Alaska Policy Forumand served on the Alaska Board of Education and Early Development.
