Site Logo
This screenshot shows a map of new Anchorage state senate districts ordered to be put in place by a state Superior Court Judge on Monday, May 16, 2022. (Alaska Redistricting Board screenshot/via Alaska Beacon)

News

Alaska’s redistricting board again gerrymandered map to benefit Republicans, judge rules

The decision will be appealed to the Alaska Supreme Court

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire Candidate for Alaska’s lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives Tara Sweeney, a Republican, was in Juneau on Monday and sat down with the Empire for an interview. Sweeney said the three main pillars of her campaign are the economy, jobs and healthy communities.

News

Sweeney cites experience in run for Congress

GOP candidate touts her history of government-related work

In this October 2019 photo, Zac Watt, beertender for Forbidden Peak Brewery, pours a beer during the grand opening for the Auke Bay business in October 2019. On Sunday, the Alaska House of Representatives OK’d a major update to the state’s alcohol laws. (Ben Hohenstatt / Juneau Empire File)

News

House approves major update to state alcohol laws, including changes for breweries

“A lot of the controversy … has been resolved.”

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire Members of the Alaska House of Representatives on Saturday rejected the budget bill passed by the Senate earlier in the week. The bill will now go to a bicameral committee for negotiations, but the end of the legislative session is Wednesday.

News

House votes down Senate’s budget as end of session nears

State budget now goes to negotiating committee

Capt. Corey Wheeler, front, commander of B Company, 1st Battalion, 52nd Aviation Regiment at Fort Wainwright, Alaska, walks away from a Chinook helicopter that landed on the glacier near Denali, April 24, 2016, on the Kahiltna Glacier in Alaska. The U.S. Army helped set up base camp on North America’s tallest mountain. The U.S. Army is poised to revamp its forces in Alaska to better prepare for future cold-weather conflicts, and it is expected to replace the larger, heavily equipped Stryker Brigade there with a more mobile, infantry unit better suited for the frigid fight, according to Army leaders. (AP Photo/Mark Thiessen, File)

News

Army poised to revamp Alaska forces to prep for Arctic fight

The U.S. has long viewed the Arctic as a growing area of competition with Russia and China

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire Alaskans for Better Government members La quen náay Liz Medicine Crow, Richard Chalyee Éesh Peterson and ‘Wáahlaal Gidáak Barbara Blake embrace on the floor of the Alaska State Senate following the passage of House Bill 123, a bill to formally recognize the state’s 229 federally recognized tribes.

News

Tribal recognition bill clears Senate, nears finish line

Senators say recognition of tribes was overdue

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire Members of the House Majority Coalition spent most of Friday, May 13, 2022, in caucus meetings at the Alaska State Capitol, discussing how to proceed with a large budget bill some have called irresponsible. With a thin majority in the House of Representatives, there’s a possibility the budget could pass.

News

State budget work stretches into weekend

Sessions have been delayed and canceled since Wednesday

A floor session of the Alaska House of Representatives was delayed Thursday, May 12, 2022, as lawmakers discussed in private how to move forward with a packed budget bill passed by the Alaska Senate. (Peter Segall / Juneau Empire)

News

With thin margins in the House, floor debate is delayed

Delayed to the call.

In this July 8, 2021, photo, adjunct history professor and research associate Larry Larrichio holds a copy of a late 19th century photograph of pupils at an Indigenous boarding school in Santa Fe during an interview in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The U.S. Interior Department is expected to release a report Wednesday, May 11, 2022, that it says will begin to uncover the truth about the federal government’s past oversight of Native American boarding schools. (AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan, File)

News

Over 500 boarding school deaths found so far

The U.S. Interior Department released a report Wednesday on Native American boarding schools

Jordyn Ortega walks the runway during an Alaska Fashion Week event on May 7, 2022. (Courtesy photo / Sydney Akagi Photography)

News

Alaska’s (fashion) capital brings fashion week back

Designers, models and attendees from across the continent came to Juneau for the show.

Flag

News

Senate tables restrictive transgender sports bill

Debate will continue.

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire Sen. Gary Stevens, R-Kodiak, and Senate Finance Committee Co-chair Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, speak with Sen. Lyman Hoffman, D-Bethel, during an all-day debate on the state’s budget on the floor of the Alaska State Senate on Tuesday, May 9, 2022.

News

Senate OKs budget with $5,600 payments to Alaskans

Senators add nearly $1 billion in amendments

President Jimmy Carter holds up the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which declared 104 million acres in Alaska as national parks, wildlife refuges and other conservation categories, after signing it into law at a ceremony at the White House in Washington, on Dec. 2, 1980. Carter on Monday, May 9, 2022, took the unusual step of weighing in on a court case involving his landmark conservation act and a remote refuge in Alaska. Carter filed a amicus brief in the longstanding legal dispute over efforts to build a road through the refuge, worried that the latest decision to allow a gravel road to provide residents access to an all-weather airport for medical evacuations goes beyond this one case and could allow millions of acres (hectares) to be opened for “adverse development.” (AP Photo, File)

News

Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

Carter filed an amicus brief in the long-standing legal dispute over efforts to build a road through the…

In this Oct. 1, 2017, photo, North America’s tallest peak, Denali, is seen from a turnout in Denali State Park, Alaska. National park rangers in Alaska on Friday, May 6, 2022, resumed an aerial search for the year’s first registered climber on North America’s tallest peak after he didn’t check in with a friend. (AP Photo/Becky Bohrer, File)

News

Rangers locate climber’s body on Alaska’s Denali

Rimml began his climb April 27 from the Kahiltna Glacier base camp at 7,200 feet, officials said.

Anne Sears, the new lead investigator for the federally-funded Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Initiative, speaks during the annual rally at the Alaska State Capitol on May 5, 2022. (Michael S. Lockett / Juneau Empire)

News

Hundreds gather for missing and murdered Indigenous people

More and more attention is being paid nationwide to the staggering violence rates.

Peter Segall / Juneau Empire State Sen. Josh Revak, R-Anchorage, sat down with the Empire in Juneau on Friday to discuss his bid for Alaska’s lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. Revak was personally close with the late Don Young, and has earned the endorsement of Young’s widow.

News

Revak runs to replace Rep. Young

State senator wants to follow in Young’s footsteps.

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland speaks during a Tribal Nations Summit during Native American Heritage Month, in the South Court Auditorium on the White House campus, on Nov. 15, 2021, in Washington. Haaland on Thursday, May 5, 2022, announced the members of a commission that will craft recommendations on how the federal government can better tackle unsolved cases in which Native Americans and Alaska Natives have gone missing or have been killed. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)

News

US panel to focus on Native American missing, slain cases

The panel includes members with diverse experiences and backgrounds

Courtesy photo / Dasha Pearson Dasha Pearson, second from right, with her sister Natalia Dontsova, center, and father Alexander Dontsov, second from right, in Seattle on March 8, 2022. Pearson’s family fled Ukraine when the war started, and now they and other displaced Ukrainians are trying to find a home in Alaska.

News

Fleeing war, Ukrainians are finding a home in Alaska

Many have family, others just can’t go home

Anchorage Police Det. Dave Cordie, left, addresses reporters Thursday, May 5, 2022, in Anchorage, Alaska, about the disappearance nine years ago of a 6-year-old boy and hopes that the public will provide new leads on the whereabouts of Deshawn McCormick. On the right is attorney Rachel Gernat with the Office of Special Prosecutions, which provides legal assistance to the police on cold cases. (AP Photo/Mark Thiessen)

News

Anchorage police seek new leads in missing child cold case

DeShawn McCormick disappeared nine years ago when he was 6 years old

Alaska state Senate President Peter Micciche, center, looks on as lawmakers gather in front of him on the Senate floor on Wednesday, May 4, 2022, in Juneau, Alaska. A bill dealing with the annual dividend paid to residents was bumped from the Senate floor on Wednesday. Micciche said it did not have the votes to pass. (AP Photo/Becky Bohrer)

News

State lawmakers struggle with dividend debate

Legislative leaders have said they see resolving the divisive debate as critical