U.S. House candidate Bill Hill trails freshman incumbent Rep. Nick Begich by 12 points in this month’s open primary, and longtime Alaska political consultants say they believe that Hill has little chance of winning.
But Hill, who’s running as an independent, says that he expects to land on top in November after the race’s most prominent Democrat stepped out of the race, allowing him to mount a more direct challenge against Begich, a Republican.
A national political expert said Hill has a shot at winning the bid for Alaska’s lone House seat by taking advantage of a political wave that favors Democrats and independents amid poor ratings for President Donald Trump nationwide.
Third-party or independent candidacies running for statewide office are nothing new in Alaska, where most voters are registered neither Democrat nor Republican. But Hill, who is not backed by a political party and has declined to say if he’ll caucus with Democrats or Republicans, is vying for the House seat just as several independent candidates in the Lower 48 are also running high-profile campaigns for statewide office, taking on Republican incumbents linked to Trump.
Those challengers, from red states like Idaho, Nebraska, Montana and South Dakota, hope to gain traction with voters by rejecting the two-party system.
That’s creating complicated choices for some Democrats in those states and Alaska — whether to back a candidate of their party that might face long odds, or to side with an independent.
Anchorage pastor Matt Schultz, the Democratic front-runner before he dropped out in mid-July to endorse Hill, said he ended his campaign after a lack of institutional support from the Democratic Party. He joins Democrats from other states who have suspended their campaigns in the congressional midterms to clear the way for independent challengers.
Begich won 44.6% of the vote after the Aug. 18 primary results were certified on Monday, beating Hill’s 32.5% by a dozen points.
Schultz, who suspended his campaign too late to be removed from the primary ballot, took third with 8.1%.
In addition to Begich and Hill, two other contenders will appear on the November ballot in Alaska’s ranked choice voting system, which sends the top four finishers in the primary to the general election, regardless of party affiliation. The race featured 15 candidates in the primary.
Eric Hafner, an incarcerated New York felon running as a Democrat, received 3.8% of the vote and will appear on the ballot. Fairbanks Libertarian Jim McDermott, who finished eighth in the primary with 1.2%, will also appear on the general election ballot after the withdrawal of Schultz and additional candidates.
Also suspending their campaigns were the fifth-place finisher, Fairbanks Democrat John Williams; the sixth-place finisher, Valdez Republican Clay Strickland; and the seventh-place finisher, Democrat Yaquelin Reynoso, who lists an address in Massachusetts.
Hill faces a tough battle against Begich, a member of a prominent political Alaska family who in 2024 defeated Democratic former Rep. Mary Peltola, who is now running for a U.S. Senate seat.
Begich has won praise for his unusual success getting legislation passed, including to improve drilling and development opportunities in Alaska and bring more royalty income to the state from oil and gas production. He says he’s helped lower costs in Alaska partly by voting for the Trump-backed One Big Beautiful Bill Act with its tax breaks, and helped advance the bill’s Rural Health Transformation Program to inject a funding windfall into improving rural healthcare in Alaska.
Begich’s campaign did not respond to requests for an interview with the lawmaker.
Hill — a Dena’ina Athabascan fisherman and retired educator from a Southwest Alaska village who was named Alaska’s Superintendent of the Year in 2023 — said in an interview that he’s confident after the primary results.
“For going from relatively no-name recognition in the state up against an incumbent who has a generational family name he can rely on, I mean, I think we did really well,” Hill said.
Hill has focused his message in part on costly inflation and healthcare. He’s blamed Begich for contributing to those problems by “jacking up our health insurance prices to pay for massive tax breaks for billionaires” and “rubber-stamping tariff taxes.”
“The loss of the ACA (Affordable Care Act) premiums have really hurt a lot of Alaskans,” Hill said, referring to the end of enhanced premium subsidies in the One Big Beautiful bill.
“And when you have Alaskans choosing between housing and healthcare, that’s abhorrent,” he said. “I think we should have good healthcare for everybody.”
As he campaigns, Hill, who lives in Naknek, said he’s hearing from Alaskans statewide that Begich “does not respond to their requests” and is not meeting their needs.
“November is both a short and a long time away, and we think that we can generate enough enough of a movement behind this campaign that we can win this,” Hill said.
Being an independent candidate will help, he said.
“I mean, we’ve seen it multiple times where independents have won in this state, and I think with 60% of Alaskans not identifying with either the Republican or the Democratic Party, there are a lot of people who would prefer to vote for an independent who can remain independent from party bosses and truly represent Alaskans in Congress,” he said.
Hill trails Begich in fundraising, with about $500,000 cash on hand, after raising $1.3 million. Hill also enjoys support from Wheel Dog PAC, a super PAC that has spent more than $2 million backing him.
Begich has about $3 million to spend, after raising $3.8 million.
Hill said his donations are largely from individuals and he’s also supported by more than 20 labor groups, including the Alaska AFL-CIO. He said he is not taking corporate PAC money.
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Schultz said in an interview that he’s voting for Hill. He said Hill will likely benefit from increased donations, now that he’s the clear challenger to Begich.
“I think anybody who wants to cast their vote for something that’s going to repair America and move the country forward should vote for Bill Hill,” Schultz said. “Nick Begich and the entire MAGA movement has been disastrous and destructive not only to Alaska, but to the entire country.”
After suspending his campaign in July, Schultz published op-eds in Alaska newspapers criticizing his lack of institutional support from the Democratic Party.
“But let me be clear: Shifting to the middle is a bad idea,” he wrote. “There is no inherent virtue in occupying the political middle, and in fact, the middle is ethically wrong in some of the most important moments in our history.”
Schultz last week reiterated his disappointment about the lack of support from the Democratic Party, saying he “simply did not have a financial path forward” to continue running against Begich and Hill.
“There’s definitely a sad reluctance and even cowardice amongst a lot of institutional Democrats to truly stand up for what they believe in and give progressive voters a choice and a voice,” he said.
Schultz has $470,000 cash on hand after raising $865,000, according to federal campaign filings from late June.
“It was a great honor and a joy and a privilege to get to run for as long as I did, and look for an announcement, hopefully very soon, about where my remaining campaign funds are going to be redirected to other progressive candidates,” he said.
Jalen Lee, spokesperson with the Alaska Democratic Party, declined to respond to a question about Schultz’s concerns with Democratic institutions, or whether the party will support Hill in the general election.
But he said, “We are laser-focused on doing whatever we can to make sure that Nick Begich does not win.”
Lee also pointed to the party’s statement in July saying that Schultz’s decision to suspend his campaign “reflects the kind of integrity and selflessness Alaskans deserve from those seeking public office.”
Jim Lottsfeldt, a political consultant who often works for left-leaning and centrist candidates and groups, called Hill a “real long shot.”
“I just don’t see the sort of enthusiasm for Bill Hill that makes me think this campaign is going to suddenly make up a lot of ground,” said Lottsfeldt, who said he volunteered for Schultz.
But the November electorate will be larger and different than in the primary, which could change the outcome, he said.
And a strong turnout of rural voters excited by Hill’s rural and Alaska Native roots could help him, Lottsfeldt said.
Some Democrat voters will likely support Hill, including some of Schultz’s supporters, but others might be skeptical of where he stands on their issues, Lottsfeldt said.
Still, the national trend of voters looking for alternatives to Republicans should give Hill a tailwind, he said.
“It looks to be an extremely good year to be a Democrat, based on the Trump administration and just the national fatigue with Republican policies not performing, so that’s in his favor,” Lottsfeldt said.
In Alaska, where oil and gas bolsters the economy, major candidates of every stripe routinely support drilling.
Hill said this week in a text that he supports oil and gas development as well as renewable energy.
“I am pro development, pro oil and gas from Alaska, pro renewables, and pro reducing fuel costs for Alaskans,” he said.
He said a recent attack by the National Republican Congressional Committee, painting him as anti-oil after he said in an online discussion that Alaska communities must “get off the sauce” of oil, was taken out of context.
The discussion, organized by BigTentUSA, included Peltola, the Democratic U.S. Senate candidate. It highlighted the unique situation of remote Alaska communities that pay stunning amounts for gasoline and other fuels, including more than $20 a gallon in one village, because the fuel must be barged or flown to the community each summer.
“Alaska is a pro-development state,“ Hill said in the discussion. ”Gas and oil will be a part of our portfolio for the foreseeable future. For communities in Alaska, we need to get off the sauce, and we need to start implementing renewables. And we need people in Congress who are willing to do that work and make those opportunities available for us.”
In a candidate forum at the Alaska Oil and Gas Association last week, Hill credited oil development for transforming Alaska with new opportunities that he saw firsthand as a kid growing up in the village of Kokhanok.
The money allowed the state to build water and sewer systems, fund Alaska Permanent Fund dividend checks and build a high school in Kokhanok, allowing him to stay home instead of leaving to attend boarding school, he said.
At the conference, Hill said he supports streamlining regulatory efforts and the need for exemptions in Alaska to support project development.
He said he supports durability for federal decisions so project requirements aren’t changed as administrations and parties change. He said he supports building the Alaska LNG megaproject and other initiatives to improve Alaska’s economic outlook.
“I mean, anything that slows down what we’re doing just gets in our way, and we need to make sure that we have a government that’s responsive to Alaska industry,” he said. “Duplicative processes, repetitive processes, processes that take a massive team of people to complete, we need to reduce all of that.”
At the forum, Begich also expressed support for streamlining permitting processes in agencies, regulatory exemptions for Alaska development and durability in federal decision-making.
Begich touted action he’s taken steps in that direction including by mandating oil and gas lease sales in areas such as in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He’s also used the Congressional Review Act in bills to remove whiplash in policy changes between administrations, such as for drilling opportunities in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.
Begich closed by saying he likes Bill Hill.
“But this isn’t about who we like, it’s about what we like,” Begich said.
“Do we want certainty?” Begich said. “Do we want to make sure we’re bringing investment into our state? Do we want to make sure that we’re generating the revenue from those federal leases coming back to support education, to support infrastructure, to provide our young people with the confidence that they need to know that they can build a life and a career and a family in Alaska? That is what I am doing.”
Alaska voters are 24% Republican and 16% Democrat, with 60% not registered with either of those parties, Lottsfeldt said.
Alan Abramowitz, a professor emeritus with Emory University with expertise in elections and voting behavior, said that he thinks Hill has a chance to win the race by picking up Democratic and nonpartisan voters, amid a national pattern of Democrats “overperforming” in red states.
“He’s an independent, but I assume he’s appealing mainly to Democratic voters and independents who lean Democratic, or at least are dissatisfied with the current Republican administration,” Abramowitz said.
“There’s a lot of discontent with the current administration, with the war, with the economy,” he said, referencing the ongoing war in Iran and inflation.
The president’s party normally doesn’t do well in the midterms anyway, he said.
Meanwhile, Art Hackney, a political consultant who often works for Republican candidates and plans to place some radio ads for Begich in the general election, believes Hill will lose.
“Bill Hill is a compelling presence, there’s no question,” Hackney said. “He’s a tough guy. He presents well. He’s got surprising amounts of money for somebody who came out of nowhere, and you can never take that for granted.”
But Hackney said Begich has a clear advantage because he’s an “authentic” candidate who can simply run on his successful record in Congress.
“In elections, you never, ever know where it’s going to go,” Hackney said.
“But unless Nick changes his tactics in some drastic way that makes people dislike him, I just cannot in a million years” see him losing to Hill, Hackney said.
Alex DeMarban is a longtime Alaska journalist who covers business, the oil and gas industries and general assignments. Reach him at 907-257-4317 or alex@adn.com.
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