JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) \u2014 The tiny Alaska Native village of Beaver is about 40 minutes \u2014 by plane \u2014 from the nearest city. Its roughly 50 residents rely on weekday flights for mail and many of their basic supplies, from groceries to Amazon deliveries of everyday household items.<\/p>\n
Air service plays an outsize role in the nation\u2019s most expansive state, where most communities rely on flights for year-round access. Planes also play a critical role in elections, getting voting materials and ballots to and from rural precincts such as Beaver and in delivering ballots for thousands of Alaskans who vote by mail \u2014 some in places where in-person voting is not available.<\/p>\n
The vast distances and relative isolation of so many communities make Alaska unique and are why its residents have a significant interest in arguments taking place Monday before the U.S. Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
Many here worry that a case from Mississippi<\/a> challenging whether ballots received after Election Day can be counted in federal elections could end Alaska\u2019s practice of accepting late-arriving ballots. Alaska counts ballots if they are postmarked by Election Day and received within 10 days, or 15 days for overseas voters in general elections.<\/p>\n \u201cThese processes have been in place for a long time just to ensure that our ballots are counted,\u201d said Rhonda Pitka, a poll worker and first chief in Beaver, which sits along the Yukon River 110 miles (177 kilometers) north of Fairbanks.<\/p>\n If the court decides ballots in all states must be received by Election Day, she said, \u201cThey\u2019ll be disenfranchising thousands of people \u2014 thousands of people in these rural communities. It\u2019s just basically saying that their votes don\u2019t count, and that\u2019s a real shame.\u201d<\/p>\n Some ballots already arrive late <\/p>\n Alaska is one of 14 states<\/a> that allow all mailed ballots postmarked by Election Day to arrive days or weeks later and be counted, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures and the Voting Rights Lab. An additional 15 provide grace periods for military and overseas ballots.<\/p>\n But Alaska\u2019s geography, weather and great distances<\/a> between communities \u2014 Alaska is more than twice the size of Texas, the nation\u2019s second-largest state \u2014 raise the stakes for voters. The unusual way the state counts its votes also makes a grace period important, advocates say.<\/p>\n Under Alaska\u2019s ranked-choice system for general elections, workers in small rural precincts call in voters\u2019 first choices to a regional election office. All ballots, however, ultimately are flown to the state Division of Elections in the capital, Juneau. There, the races not won outright are tabulated to determine a winner.<\/p>\n Even with Alaska\u2019s current 10-day grace period, ballots from some villages in 2022 were not fully counted because of mail delays. They arrived too late for tabulations in Juneau, 15 days after Election Day.<\/p>\n If the Supreme Court rules that ballots cannot be counted if they arrive at election offices after Election Day, scores of Alaska voters could be affected. About 50,000 Alaskans voted by mail in the 2024 presidential election.<\/p>\n \u201cI think there\u2019s probably no other state where this ruling could have a more detrimental impact than ours,\u201d Alaska\u2019s senior U.S. senator, Republican Lisa Murkowski said in an interview.<\/p>\n Murkowski sees the case \u2014 a challenge<\/a> by the Republican National Committee and others to Mississippi\u2019s allowance of late-arriving ballots \u2014 as an effort to end voting by mail<\/a> nationwide.<\/p>\n \u2018Seeing a level of voter intimidation\u2019<\/p>\n The RNC argues such grace periods improperly extend elections for federal office, but Mississippi responded that no voting occurs after Election Day \u2014 only the delivery and counting of already completed ballots.<\/p>\n The Supreme Court will hear arguments as the U.S. Senate is debating legislation<\/a> being pushed by President Donald Trump that would require<\/a> people to show proof-of-citizenship to register to vote and a photo ID to cast a ballot.<\/p>\n Taken together, Murkowski said such efforts could discourage people from voting.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we\u2019re seeing a level of voter intimidation, I\u2019ll just say it,\u201d she said. \u201cI feel very, very strongly that the effort that we should be making at the federal level is to do all that we can to make our elections accessible, fair and transparent for every lawful voter out there.\u201d<\/p>\n Alaska\u2019s other congressional members, Rep. Nick Begich and Sen. Dan Sullivan, both Republican allies of Trump who are seeking reelection this year, support the SAVE America Act now before the Senate. But they also said they want to ensure that ballots properly cast on or before Election Day get counted.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll see what the courts choose to do on that issue, but I do think that we need to allow for time for ballots to come in from the rural parts of our state,\u201d Begich said during a recent visit to Juneau.<\/p>\n Alaska officials highlight challenges to the court<\/p>\n