Nick Begich, who was the only Republican endorsed for Congress by the Alaska Republican Party two years ago, has done it again. He has the full — and the only — endorsement of the Alaska GOP, which voted today in Fairbanks, where he received a long standing ovation from the members attending the quarterly meeting.
Begich is polling even with Democrat Mary Peltola, who is the incumbent. But Peltola has massive fundraising advantage and the Democrats are now turning their venom spigot on full force on Begich, whom they see as a major threat to Peltola’s incumbency.
Begich filed for office in June of 2023. Over the past year, Begich had already earned nearly 40% of the endorsements from individual Republican districts in the state, and has the endorsements of House Speaker Mike Johnson, Rep. Byron Donalds, Rep. Tom Emmer, Sen. Mike Lee, and numerous other conservatives at the national level, such as business entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy. The National Republican Congressional Committee and the Congressional Leadership Fund support him, along with Americans for Prosperity Action.
Begich is the former finance chairman of the Alaska Republican Party and has been involved with the party since high school. The longtime Alaskan has been in private business his entire career and has been elected to the board of Matanuksa Electric Association. In 2022, Begich came in third for Congress after Peltola and Sarah Palin.
The party as a whole had held off endorsing anyone until after the primary; Nancy Dahlstrom and another Republican dropped out of contention, which helped bring the party together behind Begich as he faced the ranked-choice general election ballot that has two Democrats and an Alaskan Independence Party candidate on it.