Alaska Legislature: MISC-20260727-1130 Ballot Measure 3 Public Hearing

Good afternoon. This is Lieutenant Governor Nancy Dahlstrom. And with me today is Carol Beecher, Director of the Division of Elections. She's also Initiative Coordinator April Simpson and Tatiana Robbins, who's my Chief of Staff. I call this public hearing to order.

Welcome. Today's Monday, May 12th, 2026, and the purpose of this hearing is to hear from the primary sponsor and a group opposing Citizen Initiative 25 U.S.C. V. I will read the ballot summary now. The title is An Act Addressing Voter Qualification. Alaska law requires that someone must be a United States citizen and meet other requirements to vote.

This act would specify that only those who are United States citizens and meet the other requirements may vote. This act would not change the requirements to vote. The question is, should this initiative become law? This initiative is set to appear on the ballot for the upcoming November 3rd, 2026 general election. We are also going to be having another hearing on this ballot measure on August 5th in this same room, and people will be able to call in from around the state.

To testify on that day also. Today we will be hearing from the initiative sponsor, and we will also provide the opportunity for a group opposing the measure to provide testimony. We will then open up the hearing to public testimony. I would like to note that an initiative is different than legislation that is brought through the public process in the legislature. The initiative you will be hearing about today will be on the ballot election— excuse me, the primary election ballot this August as is.

Unlike legislation, this is debated in the legislature. This initiative cannot be amended or altered. Additional information pertaining to this initiative, such as the proposed bill, the ballot summary, and the cost estimate, can be found in the attachments section of the public notice, as well as on the Division of Elections website. So we would now like to start the testimony process. We are going to hear a statement of support from the sponsors, then the statement of opposition, and then open up the hearing to public testimony.

And those in the room will go first, and then we will, uh, invite people who are online. So we will now begin with the sponsor of the initiative, And we have online with us former Senator John Coghill. John, if you can hear us, please identify yourself and proceed with your testimony.

Well, good afternoon, or I guess it's good morning still. Uh, John Coghill. Thank you, Lieutenant Governor. Uh, my name is John Coghill. I, uh, I'm the I'm one of the co-sponsors of the Alaskans for Citizen Voting Initiative, which is petition 25-USCV.

And so, I thank you for the opportunity to testify today. This hearing is required by law, and I appreciate you setting it up.

Would you like me to do my testimony at this point, Lieutenant Governor? Yes, sir. Please do and proceed. Thank you. So first of all, I'd like to begin with just kind of a simple summary.

The current law says citizens may vote, but it does not specifically say that citizens only may vote. And so I'll go through the process to show why we changed that. It's a real issue. So it's, it's not a theoretical issue. For example, in Los Angeles this year elected officials moved forward with a proposal that would explicitly open the door to noncitizen voting in the city and school board elections.

The Los Angeles City Council approved that proposal in June, uh, before later sending it back for further review. And Los Angeles is not the only outlier. Across the country, as many as 2 dozen cities, local jurisdictions have already enacted some form of noncitizen voting. This shows the issue is not hypothetical. So that's why this initiative is up and why it matters.

So if anybody asks, if noncitizens are not supposed to vote in Alaska now, why do we need to measure? The answer is the law is not that clear now.

It probably, when it was first written, it was well understood. The times have changed. So before, before there's any more further confusion or litigation, actually, or an attempt to test the boundaries, Ballot Measure Number 25, USCV, is set out to clarify that by making clear that only United States citizens may be qualified voters in Alaska. So like I said earlier, the current law says citizens may vote, but it does not specifically say that only citizens may vote. And this measure just closes that gap, and it makes the law in Alaska unmistakably clear.

It does not change who is a U.S. citizen. It does not affect federal immigration law. It simply makes Alaska election law say very clearly that most Alaskans already believe that is true. We know the kind of ambiguity that we've seen matters because we've already seen it tested elsewhere in other states. In the Lacey case, for example, in San Francisco, a court held that constitutional language saying a citizen may vote did not necessarily mean that only citizens may vote.

That allowed local noncitizen voting to stand. So Alaska's constitutional wording is very similar. And so we should not wait for a similar fight here before clarifying our own law. The point of 25 USC is to close that door before it gets pushed open. It's a proactive measure, and it writes into law in plain language that voting in Alaska is reserved for U.S. citizens.

That gives clear guidance to courts, to election officials, and to the public. It's also important to say that this measure does not do some things. It does not change who can become a citizen. It does not change registration procedures for eligible voters, doesn't alter absentee voting, ID requirements, or the mechanics of running elections. It simply clarifies who is legally eligible to vote.

That clarity also helps protect people from confusion. In Alaska, we've seen how complicated questions of citizenship and nationality can become that problem, including with members of the American Samoa community. And some of these residents have served our country and our communities with distinction. So this initiative helps reduce the risk that well-intentioned people end up in trouble because the law could be unclear. It's also pro-immigrant, pro-citizen measure, and many Alaskans or their parents and grandparents came here legally, followed the rules, and completed the naturalization process so they could fully participate in the American democracy.

And the right to vote is a part of that journey. Reserving the franchise to citizens honors this commitment., and it affirms the value of citizenship. Ballot Measure 25, USCV, also helps keep election, election system straightforward, easy to administer. Clear standards reduce confusion. For the Division of Elections, nice to see you there today.

For the DMV and other agencies involved in the voter registration. They also make it less likely that ineligible voters, or individuals, that is, ineligible individuals, are mistakenly added to rolls. At the bottom, this is a question that the people of Alaska should answer clearly for themselves. It shouldn't be left to judges, to ambiguous wording from decades ago, or to future efforts that would maybe stretch the law. Other places are already moving in this direction, and Alaska should make it plain by now that voting in Alaska elections is reserved for United States citizens.

So in closing, 25 U.S.C.V. Is a narrow, common-sense measure. It aligns Alaska law with what Alaskans already believe. It addresses a real issue that's already emerging in cities across the country. It closes a legal loophole and affirms the value of United States citizenship.

I respectfully ask that this initiative be allowed to proceed to the voters of Alaska, and I thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

Thank you, Senator Coquille. We appreciate you being online with that statement. In addition to the sponsor's statement, the law requires a statement of opposition. I understand we have Representative Andrew Gray with us. I'd like to invite you to the table, and you will be preventing— excuse me, providing a statement of opposition to the initiative at this time.

So please state your name and your affiliation for the record and proceed. Thank you, Lieutenant Governor Dahlstrom. My name is Andrew Gray. I represent the Umed District in the Alaska State House, although I will be providing the con statement. I—.

This is a spontaneous decision to testify. So this is not— I guess I don't want people to think that I've spent several months working on this. This is in the moment. What we heard from Senator Coghill is that there's some sort of confusion that we have some sort of loophole in Alaska that folks are exploiting. This is misinformation.

It is very clear that currently in the state of Alaska, the only people who can vote are U.S. citizens. I have asked Director Beecher on the record about this. It has been stated clearly in the state of Alaska, only U.S. citizens can vote. Uh, we heard Senator Coghill bring up the issue of American Samoans. I also want to note that he mentioned several different things happening in California.

My statement today will be about Alaska. I am concerned about Alaska. I am not concerned about California. In Alaska, non-U.S. citizens are already forbidden from voting in local and state elections. This is what led to the arrest of voters in Whittier a couple of years ago.

In that investigation of American Samoans who had voted for an American Samoan who ran for school board, it was clear that the Anchorage Elections Office did not understand the rules. The Division of Elections did not understand the rules. Law enforcement did not understand the rules. And unfortunately, in that environment of no one understanding the rules, neither did the American Samoans who were arrested. They did not understand the rules either.

So as House Judiciary Chair, we have worked on this issue. And for folks who don't understand, American Samoans born in American Samoa carry one passport, a U.S. passport. They pledge allegiance to one flag, the American flag, and they serve in one military, the U.S. military. And I have served with American Samoans in the Alaska National Guard, and I have deployed with them, and they are patriots. They should be able to vote.

They should be able to run for local office like the school board, and they should be able to serve their local communities. What this ballot measure before us does is make it so that they can never do that, barring any action from the federal government. It does not look like at this moment, from my vantage point, that the American federal government is about to expand voting rights to American Samoans. So this ballot measure would really constrain what the legislature can do to solve this issue. What an American Samoan is currently is an American national.

Currently, only U.S. citizens can vote in local and state elections. There is room at this particular moment without this ballot measure of expanding being able to vote and serve at the local school board, for example, if we were to expand it to American nationals in Alaska. And I think that that's the just thing to do. I think it's the right thing to do. I think it's the moral thing to do.

And so I fear that that's not what voters in the ballot box are going to see when they see this ballot measure. They're going to think this is, oh, this is simple. We want it to be only I wish I could be there with those voters and say, "It already says that. We already know that only U.S. citizens can vote, and what we are doing is hurting a population of Alaskans who want to serve their community and want to vote in their community, and this ballot measure will prevent that." And so I have to ask myself, why is this ballot measure coming forth right now? The only evidence of folks who are not citizens voting in Alaska in recent memory are these American Samoans in Whittier.

And so is this ballot measure in response to that? If so, that breaks my heart. It breaks my heart that those people would be led to this moment in time. I think in our country today, we have seen a, um, a spread of misinformation and disinformation that we somehow have numerous number of non-US citizens voting. We know that that is simply not true.

We do not have mass numbers of non-US citizens voting, but I think that folks are performing for a federal audience to say, "We hear you and we're going to do something about it." And I think that's what led to 3,500 letters going out to new Americans here in Alaska to say that they have to go through an additional step to prove that they are a US citizen, to prove that they can vote, that we're not requiring of any other US citizen in Alaska. I beg people to vote no on this ballot measure. It is unnecessary. Our law is currently clear. Do not hamstring the legislature from being able to do the moral right thing and help American Samoans vote.

Thank you, Lieutenant Governor. Thank you, Director Beecher. And thank you, Ms. Robbins. Thank you, Representative Gray, for that testimony.

We are now going to open the hearing to public testimony.

I would like to be a little bit lenient on the time to people that want to testify unless we all of a sudden get a room full of people, and if so, I will ask the testifiers to take 2 minutes. So we will start with those who have signed up, and I would like to honor the people that are in the room first. Representative Galvin, if you would please come to the table, identify yourself and your affiliation, and please share your testimony. Thank you, Lieutenant Governor. My name is Elise Galvin, and I am a representative here in Midtown.

You're sitting in my district, but I am speaking as an individual. I will share a story of a constituent because I think it's relevant to why I feel this way, but I have not done research to know where my constituents all are on this topic, nor have I and my caucus come up with an official statement. So this is again my thoughts. I think I appreciate the former senator and his comments around trying to, I think, develop more— I think what he was trying to do is create more public trust in the election or in our system of voting. But I will say This may be misplaced, particularly in light of our most recent actions by the Division of Elections, which I've already brought up to you.

But to me, I do agree with what we heard from Representative Gray that we already have it in law in Alaska that we may not vote unless we are a U.S. citizen. I do think that it is something we should continue to enforce. I think that that's very critical to our system and integrity. Uh, but because that protection is already in place, I would, um, say that the question before us now as a state is how we can move forward in a way that does no harm. And I say that because of what I've seen as experiences by those who have been questioned about their citizenship.

And I shared with Director Beecher just earlier today an example wherein they were asked— and again, it's part of a way of trying to clean up the rolls— they were asked, "Hey, can you prove up that you're a citizen?" Well, 3 years ago they went to the DMV with their new passport. They were so excited to be new U.S. citizens. Again, 2023. And they brought that into the DMV, and yet somehow they're getting a letter from the Division of Elections because they're in the questionable category. And I will say that my, um, constituent, now a newfound friend, um, is scared.

They're afraid to go into the polls. That's not okay. They're afraid because of all of this rhetoric around, um, what's happening with ICE and everything else. They don't know if now they're on some special list. How do I get off the list, all of that.

They don't know how to navigate the system in a way that makes them feel comfortable enough to vote. And frankly, I don't know how to help them do that. That is a concern of mine, a deep concern of mine, because if you are already English language challenged and you receive a letter— I read the letter myself— the letter has many words that have more than 3 syllables, so many words that are 4-syllable words. By the way, that's difficult for someone who is new to the English language. So they're seeing this, they're being questioned about their citizenship, you may not vote yet, blah blah blah blah blah.

Yesterday he followed up with a photograph of his— of the 3-year-old voter card that he had received from the Division of Elections and the new voter card which he received because they did the right paperwork and called and said, yes, I'm a citizen. Those two cards are absolutely identical. The difference is when they received the first one, they couldn't wait to get into the polls and vote. Couldn't wait. They were so proud, so excited, and now they're scared to death.

And yet it's the very same card because our system somehow has created fear. And my worry is that this particular ballot measure is going to engender more of that, more of this sort of action and more of this sort of fear. When I would be comfortable supporting it if I knew we actually had a problem. If somebody said, look at all these voters who shouldn't have voted. Well, you just heard from our representative from the Umeå district that that has happened in the Samoan community.

Very, very devastatingly. And, and that's a cert— that's again, that's all because it's related to federal law. That's the way that's set up. We can do something differently here if we chose to, but right now we're following the federal law. No, nothing other than a U.S. citizen.

So again, I think this, this particular ballot may be creating more stress. I am against this ballot measure because I think it's going to bring us down actions that will cause us to unfortunately not be participatory in our election system. And I am all about making sure we have a proud tradition of fair and independent elections here, and we should only continue to strengthen that in a system with ways that are grounded in evidence and expand participation and not reduce it. Thank you for hearing me. Appreciate it.

Thank you, Representative Galvin. We will next go to testifiers online, and first in the queue is Jack. I do not have a last name. Jack, if you can hear me, please identify yourself, your affiliation, and proceed with your testimony. Thank you.

My name is Jack Tomczak, and I am the Vice President of Outreach for Americans for Citizen Voting. Americans for Citizen Voting is a nonpartisan organization dedicated to citizen-only voting. We work with legislators and citizens to clarify statutes and amend state constitutions to make it so only U.S. citizens are allowed to vote in local, state, and federal elections. In 2011, 4 cities in Maryland allowed noncitizen voting. Now, 24 cities across 4 states allow noncitizen voting.

Including in our nation's capital, Washington, D.C. The noncitizen voting movement is growing, and it would be unwise to think any state is immune. Maryland now has 12 cities with noncitizen voting. Illinois, California, Vermont, and the District of Columbia round out the other 12. In recent years, Oakland and San Francisco in California legalized noncitizen voting.

Los Angeles publicly played with the idea in June, These are not small towns. 3 Cities in Vermont legalized noncitizen voting recently over the veto of their governor. Noncitizen voting is not a made-up problem. Noncitizen voting is coming to every state that doesn't take proactive steps to prevent it. Since 2018, 15 states have amended their state constitutions to allow only citizen voting.

68% Of Alaskans support this measure. Americans for Citizen Voting supports this initiative to change the statute and would support an amendment to the Alaska Constitution to further solidify that in Alaska, only U.S. citizens will ever be allowed to vote in local, state, and federal elections. Thank you. Thank you, Jack, for your testimony.

At the moment, we do not have anyone else online. And we do not have anybody in the room that I see signed up to testify, so we will go at ease until we have our next caller.

Good afternoon. Patricia, you are next in the queue to testify. If you would identify yourself and then please proceed with your testimony.

Thank you. My name is Patricia Bounton, down here on the Kenai, and I am, I am supporting Ballot Measure 3. I encourage Alaskans to vote yes on Ballot Measure 3. This measure is about protecting one of the most fundamental rights in our constitutional republic, the right of American citizens to determine the future of their government. While the Alaska Constitution already limits voting to United States citizens, Ballot Measure 3 reinforces that principle in state law and leaves no room for doubt.

Ballot Measure 3 does not take away anyone's right to vote. It does not change who is eligible to vote. If new citizens have nothing to hide, nothing to run away from, having to prove you are an American citizen is a badge of honor and a badge of pride. All new citizens will have pride in proving they can vote. Alaskans have always valued fair elections, personal responsibility, and the rule of law.

Ballot Measure 3 reflects those values by reinforcing the qualifications for voting that already exist under our Constitution. I respectfully encourage my fellow Alaskans to vote yes on Ballot Measure 3. To help preserve transparent and trusted elections for generations to come. Thanks for letting me testify. Thank you for your testimony, Patricia.

We will go at ease for our next testifier.

We are back on record and have a testifier ready to go. Representative Holland, if you'd like to come up to the table, identify yourself please, and share your testimony. Good afternoon. Thank you for the opportunity to be here. I am Kai Holland, and I am testifying today on my own behalf, although I am also a representative of House District 9, so I appreciate that acknowledgment, but I am making comments on my own personal behalf at this point.

But it is informed by doing a lot of work in the community. With regard to Measure 3, I think I have 3 points I want to touch on briefly. One is the standing that this measure may have in this election. Second is the form of the ballot language that may be on the actual printed ballots. And three is the general issue as it relates to access to voting that this measure is touching on.

So, on the first point, I think the issue that surprised me when this ballot measure first came to my attention was that it, in essence, does not change anything. About the qualifications to vote. And so, it seemed a bit curious that we were going to spend a lot of time with people out collecting signatures on the question of, should someone have to be a U.S. citizen to vote, when, in fact, our current statutes say, "You shall be a citizen to vote." That this language of putting in "only" at the front of this was creating this false narrative in our community that perhaps maybe that wasn't already the case. And it is unfortunate that the way the Constitution looks at citizen initiatives and the ability of the legislature to preempt that initiative going on to the ballot, um, recognizes that there's no reason to have an initiative on a ballot if it covers something that the legislature has already essentially covered in statute, and in this case, what the ballot says and what— the statutes currently say, is essentially identical, except that there's a little tiny exception here that says that that statute passed by the legislature has to be after the point at which the initiative has been certified. So in this case, we have existing language that's been on the statute for some time that was not passed after this ballot measure was actually certified.

So technically speaking, It perhaps can be on the ballot even though it does nothing. Yet it introduces into our community the question that maybe it did something. Um, so I would hope down the road that we might look at the question of, do we allow citizen initiatives to go on to a ballot that substantially don't accomplish anything? Consistent with the Constitution's intent that we would not be voting on initiatives that were already being taken care of through statutes. So, the discussion we had last week around the flexibility that elections has suggested last week the idea that perhaps if we could remove an entire candidate from a ballot because it was determined to be confusing, that it was perhaps putting a question to the voters that maybe wasn't addressing the real intent.

That elections actually had a little more discretion to make sure the ballot is clear and, uh, effective in conveying to voters what they're accomplishing by their vote. In this particular case, I think it's a question that could have been explored whether or not this ballot measure would have been a measure that in fact only creates confusion to the voters as opposed to clarity on what they're actually voting on, and perhaps the Division of Elections might have found standing, as they did in this other situation, to have said, "Maybe this shouldn't be on the ballot." That being the case, that we have this before us and that it has been certified, it then moves to my second point, which is the ballot, as I understand it from the PDF that's online, appears to suggest the question, should this new amended language be enacted. And as I read the PFD, and perhaps I'm not seeing it as clear as it might be in the actual printed document, it doesn't appear to me that it actually is clearly providing to the voter an explanation of what is being amended and changed. It looks like, if you read it casually, that the measure is saying, should we amend the statute such that someone has to meet the 4 criteria to be a voter. Well, that's not being amended.

Those 4 criteria are verbatim already in statute. So my primary testimony and my ask here would be that I think the ballot measure, as it's printed in the actual ballots that people will vote on, needs to be changed so that it's very clear that if we're going to put this before voters, that they actually know what's being changed. Perhaps even with a preamble statement that is clarifying that these 4 criteria for voting are already in place, are not being changed, and that this ballot measure is only seeking to put a preamble and post-statement on there so that folks know what they're voting on. They're clear on this. But more importantly, I want Alaskans to be very, very clear that nothing's changing.

You have to be a U.S. citizen to vote. That was the case, it is the case, and whether this measure fails or doesn't fail, nothing changed. And I don't want them to have any confusion about that point. I don't want us to be arguing about should you be a U.S. citizen to vote. Not a point to argue about.

It's settled. Which gets me to the final point. We're doing too much, in my opinion, to make people be concerned about the elections. We're raising questions about it. We've got a ballot measure that I'm talking about here, Ballot Measure 3, which gets people to wonder about, well, gosh, you know, do we have noncitizens voting?

Well, that's not our system. That's not what we've been doing. But then we go off and arrest some citizens in, or residents in Whittier, because they filled out election paperwork that didn't have a citizenship category that matched their situation as American Samoans. Or we've just gone and purged the active voter rolls with information that seems somewhat questionable in terms of the source and the process. We continue to be acting in a way that, in my opinion, is trying to plant doubt, trying to create uncertainty around our election process.

And the Division of Elections has done a great job of running elections for decades that we know have given us trustworthy, sound results. And any audit of that has never questioned the soundness of the process that's being run. I don't want to see us undermining the confidence that has been built up over decades and administrations that have done such a good job. And this one too can continue that legacy. We're not moving in the right direction though if we continue to support initiatives that give people a reason to wonder Can we trust our voting system?

Can we trust our rolls? Do we have non-residents or non-citizens voting on this? We're creating questions that don't need to exist. Can we improve the process? Probably.

I know there were some changes that we were working on and you're working on to make sure we've got people out at particularly remote polls and whatnot, and I really appreciate the work you're doing. But let's work on building people's confidence and increasing their access to voting, not support efforts that are causing some doubt or uncertainty that would cause someone who might be on the edge of, do I take the time to vote or not? Well, if they don't have confidence, clarity that their vote matters and their vote counts, and it is a vote that will be done in a way that they know the results are sound, then that person may not go to vote. And I don't think that's good for our state. So I appreciate your time today.

I hope you will consider the format of the ballot and the language as it's printed that will provide clarity to voters on what they are actually voting on and what is changing, and more importantly, what is not changing. Thank you. Thank you, Representative Holland, for your testimony. Appreciate it. Thank you.

We will at ease until our next testifier.

I would like to note that it is now 1:30 PM and there are no remaining members of the public either online or in person to testify. So we are now going to conclude this public hearing. Want to thank all those who have provided testimony today and especially to the LegisFairs agency staff for helping us. Thank you so much. All parties have spoken.

Spoken or had an opportunity to speak, this hearing on Citizen Initiative 25, USCV, is now adjourned. Thank you.