Alaska has just one U.S. House seat, but the race between incumbent Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola and three challengers is on track to be the most expensive in the country and the most expensive in Alaska history, with more than $15 million spent by party-aligned political groups and $31 million spent altogether across all candidates in both the primary and general elections.
Among the campaign ads flooding Alaskans’ mailboxes is a mailer — there are several versions — that incorrectly claims a Peltola vote against an oil-production bill “weakened the Permanent Fund and shrunk our PFD checks.”
The mailer’s claim includes a footnote to an Alaska Beacon article about possible future financial weakness in the Permanent Fund, but that article was written almost a year before Peltola’s vote and has no connection to it.
Furthermore, Peltola’s vote took place as state lawmakers were setting the amount of this year’s Permanent Fund dividend and had no impact on debates within the state Capitol.
The dividend is based on expected revenue in the coming fiscal year, not on speculative future revenue.
Additionally, most of the Permanent Fund’s value is due to investment income, not oil revenue, and it’s even unclear whether oil production would have been increased by the bill Peltola opposed.
The bill could have reversed restrictions on oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska — assuming it could have passed the Senate and survived a presidential veto — but developing new oil projects on the North Slope can take a decade or more.
The Willow project, now under construction in the petroleum reserve, has been in the works for at least eight years. While the state is expected to gain revenue from the development in the long term, it will actually reduce state revenue in the short term, shrinking the amount of revenue available for dividends.
A 2021 lease sale in ANWR attracted little interest.
The group behind the incorrect ads is Club for Growth Action, which has spent more than $56.6 million over the past two years in support of conservative candidates nationwide.
Club for Growth endorsed Peltola’s Republican challenger, Nick Begich, earlier this year, and Begich has a long history with the group, completing a fellowship with Club for Growth before his 2022 run for House.