On Monday, October 5, Vice President JD Vance spoke at a rally in Fairbanks, encouraging Alaskans to re-elect Senator Dan S. Sullivan and Rep. Nick Begich. He focused on Sullivan’s work advancing policy on energy, military, and fishing, contrasting Sullivan’s record with Peltola’s failure to get bills across the line or even show up to vote many times. He also highlighted Peltola support of boys playing in girls’ sports, open border policies, and opposition to resource development.
Vance appeared with Sullivan, the incumbent Republican, who is running against Democrat Mary Peltola. The visit came the same day the U.S. Department of Energy announced funding for a new Railbelt power line.
He started with thanking Governor Mike Dunleavy and said Sullivan had told him to start in Fairbanks because it is where Sullivan’s wife, Julie, is from and where they first settled. He praised the university, the northern lights, and people who work in the extreme cold, and he urged people to vote in Fairbanks municipal elections, which are underway today, October 6.
First, he talked about why Alaskans should re-elect Begich on November 3. He praised Begich’s unusually productive freshman record of 14 sponsored bills with 6 of them signed into law. “That’s actually the most by a freshman in the history of the United States House of Representatives,” he stated.
Then Vance spoke in support of Senator Dan Sullivan, emphasizing his service in the U.S. Marines and calling him one of the best colleagues from his own two years in the Senate. He said that when Sullivan entered office the Pentagon treated Alaska as a strategic backwater, but Sullivan’s work put Alaska front and center in national defense talks, producing the largest military buildup in the state since World War II. He cited two F-35 squadrons “right down the road,” the 11th Airborne Division, and missile-defense spending. The Army reactivated the 11th Airborne Division in Alaska on June 6, 2022, placing about 12,000 soldiers under one Arctic-focused command. Two F-35A squadrons, 54 aircraft, were stood up at Eielson Air Force Base by May 2022.
On fisheries, Vance accused Peltola of talking about commercial fishing while doing little in office, contrasting her record with Sullivan’s. “What did Mary Peltola do for Alaska’s fisherman when she was in office? Not a damn thing,” he stated. “It’s thanks to Dan that our Coast Guard is now patrolling the waters, ensuring that Alaska’s fish go to Alaska’s fishermen, not to foreigners who are trying to steal from our fisheries.” He also joked about getting late night texts from Sullivan on salmon fishing: “What nobody tells you is that Dan Sullivan is going to text you at 3 in the morning with lessons about commercial salmon fishing.”
On energy, Vance said Sullivan has pushed to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and drilling in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. He then talked about the Department of Energy’s announcement of the Alaska Rail Transmission Project, which includes approximately $400 million to build more than 200 miles of transmission line connecting Beluga and Healy.
He called the Alaska LNG project the country’s top energy-dominance priority, saying foreign buyers should help build it or face a tax on energy they import. He highlighted the project’s 40-year history, claiming that he and President Trump would get it done.
Regarding Peltola, Vance said Democrats are running “the same woman” Alaskans “kicked out of Congress in 2024,” when Begich won the at-large House seat. He said Peltola got no bill signed into law in two House terms and failed to show up for many votes. “Her sole job was to support Alaskans in the House of Representatives. Yet, she couldn’t be bothered to show up for one in five votes,” he stated. The claim checks out. According to the House Clerk roll calls compiled by GovTrack, Peltola missed 234 of 1,241 votes in the 118th Congress or 18.9 percent, close to one in five, ranking her as the 10th most absent among all U.S. Representatives.
He also said she voted supports boys competing in girls’ sports. On April 20, 2023, the House passed H.R. 734, the Protection of Women and Girls in Sports Act, 219–203, with the vote split along party lines. The Clerk’s roll call records Peltola as voting no. The bill ties school-sports eligibility under Title IX to biological sex and has been received in the Senate. He also said she voted to “keep the Mexican border wide open” and to let “illegal aliens” participate in elections. He claimed that in 2023 she co-led a bill to roll back Biden-era limits on new oil and gas leases, then voted against her own bill after Nancy Pelosi asked her to.
Then Vance talked about Peltola’s spending habits, stating that her campaign committee spent approximately $200,000 on hotels and restaurants, including Grubhub and DoorDash, and that she worked as a lobbyist making almost half a million dollars a year. Federal Election Commission filings for Mary Peltola for Alaska, committee C00812388, are the underlying record. A March 2026 complaint filed with the FEC cites those reports for travel, lodging, meals, and DoorDash and Grubhub charges, and for total post-election spending above $200,000. The complaint’s own breakdown does not put the full sum on hotels and restaurants alone. The complaint also alleges that Peltola was paid $400 million as a “purported lobbyist,” an amount which “grossly exceeded the value of the work (or lack thereof) that she was performing.”
Vance closed by asking voters to return Sullivan to the Senate and to vote for Begich, describing Alaska as a living frontier and warning of Democrats’ intentions to use the state to impeach Trump and shut down energy projects.
Watch the full speech:
