The U.S. is now a major stakeholder in a mining company.
President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing his administration to approve permits for a mining access road in Alaska. The order also directs the president’s administration to invest $35.6 million into the mining company managing the project, which would make the U.S. government a 10 percent shareholder in the company. President Trump intends to purchase another 7.5 percent stake at a later date.
“This is something that should have been long operating and making billions of dollars for our country and supplying a lot of energy and minerals and everything else that we are talking about,” President Trump said at a signing event in the Oval Office.
President Biden’s administration had previously rejected the permits necessary for this 211-mile road, over concerns of its impact on caribou and fish that native communities rely on for food supplies.
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As the Lord Leads, Pray with Us…
For President Trump to be wise in his economic investments and support for energy development.
For U.S. officials as they issued permits for access into national public lands for management and mining.
They met as kids in the late 1980s — Lisa was 5 and Michelle 10 — and grew up as neighbors, family friends and schoolmates. In 2004, by chance, they graduated from subsequent Alaska flight attendant training classes and months later were assigned to the same flight. For years, whenever their schedules overlapped, they worked side by side, catching up in the galley and strengthening a bond that already felt lifelong.
In 2014, over dinner on a New York City layover, one simple question changed everything: “Why don’t we buddy bid?” That moment sparked a 12‑year tradition of bidding for and working on the same trips. Now, if you see Lisa on your Alaska flight, chances are Michelle is nearby.
“Working together feels effortless. We can read each other, anticipate what the other needs and assist each other in difficult situations,” Michelle said. Their chemistry shows in the cabin — fun, intuitive and always in sync. They carpool to the airport, plan their work meals and spend layovers exploring, shopping or catching up with fellow crew friends. They share a love of sports too, with memories of cheering on the Knicks in Manhattan and the Saints during a New Orleans layover.
Gov. Mike Dunleavy is flanked by muncipal, state and federal law enforcement officials as he addresses a press conference on narcotics interdiction efforts in Alaska held at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport on Thursday. (Bill Roth / ADN)
Alaska officials continue seizing record-setting volumes of illegal drugs, much of it through ramped-up efforts at the state’s main airport complex in Anchorage, though in lower quantities than 2024.
On Thursday, the Alaska Department of Public Safetyreleased its annual drug report for 2025, a compilation of data and trends from law enforcement agencies. While the total amount of hard drugs seized was down about 10% from what law enforcement officials intercepted in 2024, the confiscations still dwarf similar figures from recent years.
A decade ago, for example, police reported seizing 4,249 grams of methamphetamine in Alaska during 2016. By 2020, the volume of meth seized was up more than sevenfold to 30,187 grams. In 2025, they turned up 125,300 grams of meth,roughly 15% less than the amount seized in 2024, according to the new report.
Seizures were slightly down last year for other street drugs, including fentanyl and heroin. Only confiscations of cocaine were greater last year than in 2024, rising 67% from 30,819 to 51,328 grams, according to the state’s data.
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Most of the illegal drugs seized — 82%, according to the new report — were discovered at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport, either carried by passengers or sent in through the mail and cargo freight streams. In the case of fentanyl, which is largely blamed for Alaska’s persistently high rate of fatal overdoses, 90% of what was seized last year was at the airport complex.
According to Department of Public Safety Commissioner James Cockrell, the modest decline in drug busts is a sign that ongoing coordination between law enforcement agencies on interdiction is working.
“We’re seeing a reduction in drugs coming into Alaska,” Cockrell said at a media briefing held in the airport’s North Terminal the same day the drug report was released.
Hard drugs tend to come into Alaska by air or maritime routes from larger metro areas like Phoenix, Los Angeles and Seattle, Cockrell said. From Anchorage, the shipments are either broken down for sale within the municipality and along the road system, or moved farther along to hub communities and villages in rural Alaska via air carriers, where the prices paid per dose can climb drastically.
“There is a strong correlation between distance from a regional hub and price — the farther a drug or alcohol is trafficked from a regional hub, the greater the retail price,” the DPS report states. A pressed blue fentanyl pill that sells for $4 to $10 on the streets of Anchorage, for example, can be sold for around $100 in Nome, Bethel or Dillingham, according to data from the department.
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Cockrell said it was a “game changer” when Alaska law enforcement began a closer working relationship with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service in 2024, which helped enable and expedite more investigations into suspected drug parcels. Seizure volumes shot up, almost entirely at the airport.
State Attorney General Stephen Cox said at Thursday’s briefing that more conversations are beginning about policy changes to further curb drug traffic into Alaska.
He pointed to the Dunleavy administration’s recent collaboration with Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance’s administration to prosecute more shoplifting crimes, and a forthcoming expansion of enforcement over “quality of life” problems like “open air drug offenses.”
“Lower-level crimes, they matter, because they shape whether people feel safe in their own communities,” Cox said.
The event was short on detailed policy changes or new resources being added to enforcement efforts.
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“Not every new initiative needs money,” Gov. MikeDunleavy said. “It’s about approaching things differently … I think you’re going to see some great things, even without money.”
The governor emphasized the need to break down jurisdictional silos between state, federal, local and tribal entities to improve drug interdiction and prosecution. He also repeatedly cited all the ways the Trump administration has supported the cause over the last year since returning to office.
“If you don’t think the Trump administration is serious about crime, just watch those videos off the coast of Venezuela, or off the coast of the eastern Pacific,” Dunleavy said, referring to controversial military strikes on small boats alleged to be transporting drugs. “The president is pretty clear that he wants this country to improve greatly and quickly.”
Office of National Drug Control Policy Director Sara Carter speaks during a press conference on narcotics interdiction efforts in Alaska held at the airport on Thursday. (Bill Roth / ADN)
Dunleavy was joined at the event by national “drug czar” Sara Carter, confirmed last month as head of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.
Carter spoke in general terms about federal efforts to combat cartels and other organized criminal networks trafficking drugs.
“We will hunt them in the mail. We will hunt them at the border. And we will hunt them in the labs abroad where this poison is made,” she said.
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Dunleavy, whose second term as governor will end in December and is barred from running again, said Thursday’s discussion of ongoing drug interdiction efforts was “just the beginning of the process.”
“It’s not a photo op, it’s not a press conference just for press conference sake,” Dunleavy said, flanked by law enforcement officials from state, federal and local agencies. “We’re gonna have to engage the courts sooner or later, we’re gonna have to engage the Legislature as we run into things.”
Students and school officials from across Alaska visited the Legislature — from the North Slope, to the Yukon Flats, to Yakutat and Hoonah — to make what has become an annual plea to lawmakers to invest in the state’s public education.
“I have been in this building every February for 20 years, and for 20 years I have been saying nearly the same exact thing, and we’re at a point now where that conversation is at an inflection point, ” said Lon Garrison, executive director of the Association of Alaska School Boards, which organizes the annual fly-in event on Monday.
“Pretty soon, public education will not work in the state of Alaska,” he said. “And we have to do something. We have to be bold.”
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Decades of deferred maintenance for Alaska’s schools is reaching crisis levels, lawmakers heard, with some districts grappling with deteriorating school buildings, failing water and sewer systems.
Alaska’s school maintenance problems are well-known, but the schools’ needs come with a multi-million dollar price tag. Lawmakers will be negotiating how much to allocate to schools among a slate of other dire state funding needs, from transportation to increased disaster relief funding. That negotiation is further complicated by declining oil prices and state revenues — and the threat of Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s veto pen.
But on Monday, students and school board members, some parents themselves, shared emotional testimony of how schools continue to endure failing infrastructure.
“Some of our schools are so riddled with black mold that I developed a headache almost immediately,” said Julia Phelen, a member of the school board with the Delta-Greely School District, on visiting rural schools in the Delta Junction area district. “Some of them have only one working restroom in the entire building, and others are hauling water and using honey buckets.”
Last year, the Legislature approved $38 million to address school maintenance needs on the state’s major maintenance list, a ranking of school projects submitted to the state for reimbursement. That was enough to cover the top nine projects on the list. Gov. Dunleavy vetoed that down to roughly $12.8 million, citing declining oil prices and state revenues, to fund the top three projects on the list.
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This year, whether lawmakers will allocate more funding for public education remains uncertain amid early budget negotiations.
But leaders in the bipartisan Senate Majority Caucus expressed support for addressing more of schools’ major facilities needs at a news conference on Tuesday.
“Now this year, we’ve got $401 million on the deferred maintenance list of schools,” said Sen. Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, a member of the Senate Finance Committee. “We need to have a dialogue with the administration and try to get them to work with us so we can, you know, slow down this deferred maintenance. Because every year doesn’t get addressed, it just gets worse.”
The deteriorating school facilities are coupled with stretched budgets — some districts face steep budget shortfalls and school closures — and rising costs, especially for rural districts. Some speakers said budget shortfalls are forcing districts to cut classes, teachers and activities, which they said is posing a growing risk to students’ safety and wellbeing, including mental health.
Reanna Brown, a school board member from Yakutat, testified that in rural communities like hers, which are connected to the road system only by boat and plane, the costs of education are higher, from retaining teachers to powering buildings and transporting supplies.
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“Our students deserve the same opportunities as any student in Alaska, regardless of their zip code,” Brown said. “Stable, equitable education funding allows us to retain quality educators, support student services and provide safe, consistent learning environments.”
In the Yukon Flats School District, which covers a vast area in the northeast of the state, Rhonda Pitka, a school board member, said the decades of deferred maintenance is a constant problem.
“There’s always a problem with the sewer systems and the water systems,” Pitka said. “One of our smallest schools, Chalkyitsik, has about 13 students this year, but they’ve had this water issue for like, 20 years,” she said.
She said extreme cold and the remoteness of schools in the Interior is also exacerbating schools’ water and sewer issues.
“We have incredibly cold weather. It was 50 below for five weeks, and then it hit a three day streak of minus 70 below in the Interior. So, you know, at those temperatures, nothing’s running, nothing’s working,” Pitka said, and spoke about the difficulties of retaining essential maintenance workers in the villages at $20 per hour.
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Many speakers thanked lawmakers for supporting the increase to the state’s per student funding, the base student allocation, last year, but said that state education funding still falls far short of what is needed.
“Every day we see the impact of not having enough resources for our education,” said Melina Pangiak, who testified with a classmate, Lucia Patrick, from the Chevak school in the Kashuniamut School District in Western Alaska.
The students spoke about the cuts to elective classes and learning opportunities. “Elective classes are more than just extra courses. They are where we discover what excites us and where we find talents and when we could discover our future paths,” Pangiak said.
“When these classes are cut or limited, it feels like doors are being closed on our potential,” Patrick added.
Students and school officials testified that there is a growing need for more school counselors and resources for mental health support.
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“Our region recently experienced another suicide, which deeply affected our students and our only regional counselor,” said Kay Andrews, a school board member from the Southwest Region School District that includes eight schools spanning across the Bristol Bay region.
“Schools are more than our classrooms. They are community centers. They are safe places for our children, yet, schools are being asked to do more with less,” she said.
Some speakers pointed to bill proposals that lawmakers are considering this year as potential solutions. Some testified in support of House Bill 261, proposed this year by Rep. Andy Story, D-Juneau, that would redefine how districts calculate their student count to create more predictable budget estimates in the spring.
“It’s come to be a guessing game, almost, because we’re not sure how many students we’re going to have,” said Jack Strong, a board member from the Chatham School District, which serves four rural schools in Southeast Alaska. “It’s really hurting us in the long run, our children are not getting the education that they need, basically because of the way the paper shuffle is.”
Speakers also expressed support for state pension reform, House Bill 78, currently being debated in the House Finance Committee, to help support recruitment and retention of teachers.
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Students came with solutions as well: Maddie Bass, a sophomore at Juneau Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé testified to the stress of teachers struggling with low pay, and leaving to pursue other jobs with healthcare benefits. Following the hearing, Bass said she’d like to see the state generate more tax revenue from the millions of tourists that visit Alaska each year.
“I’m seeing the government turning to taxing Alaskans. They want to tax Alaskans more instead of taxing corporations, and I think that that is the wrong idea,” Bass said. “I think to bolster the education system in Alaska, it would be a good idea to tax the tourism industry or cruise ships more, instead of putting a further burden on Alaskans that are just trying to work, learn and live here in the state.”
