Anchorage’s Matthew Chagluak performs an Alaskan High Kick during the 2024 Traditional Games in Juneau on Saturday, April 6, 2024. (Photo by Clarise Larson/KTOO)
The 2026 Traditional Games begin in the capital city on Friday. Around 200 participants from around the state and at least three other countries will compete through Sunday at Juneau Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé.
The free event is co-hosted by the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska and Sealaska Heritage Institute, with an opening ceremony featuring a parade of the athletes Saturday at 12:30 p.m.
KTOO’s Mike Lane spoke with coach, competitor and co-founder Kyle Kaayak’w Worl to learn about the importance of the games and what’s new this year.
Listen:
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The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.
Mike Lane: What exactly are the games?
Kyle Worl: So the event has a collection of Indigenous games, and they’re mostly from the north, the Arctic. So you have the high kicks that are traditional Iñupiaq or Inuit games. We have stick pulls from the Interior Dene people. But this year, we’ve kind of broadened the perspective of traditional games and we are also including some traditional games in the form of workshops from our guests from New Zealand and Mexico. And then we have some canoeing activity as well, which is canoeing is one of our traditional forms of games here in Southeast as well.
Mike Lane: How many events are there in total?
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Kyle Worl: There are 12 competitive events where you can medal in. They hold cultural significance.
The seal hop is a game that is based on a hunting technique that was used in the Arctic to sneak up to seals laying out on the ice flow. And back when harpoons were used, you had to be able to get in range to hand throw that harpoon, and simply walking up to the seal wouldn’t work, you’d scare it off and it would jump back in the ocean. So the hunters developed a technique to hop like a seal to sneak up to the seal, and that’s what this game is based on. You’re in a like a push-up position on your hands and toes, and you have to hop for the greatest distance and the furthest distance places in the game, and it’s a game of both endurance and also pain tolerance. You’ll see the athletes, they’ll sometimes break skin as they hop on their their knuckles. It depends on the age groups — high schoolers, boys, they hop on their first knuckles, but the adults that compete have to hop on a closed fist. So we’ll see some pretty battered hands with broken skin as they go along the gym floor.
Mike Lane: You’ve got people coming from all over the world to compete and also put on some workshops.
Kyle Worl: Yeah. So this event has grown every year, and it’s, we always say, what can we do next year to bring it to the next level? And we wanted to bring a more international perspective to the games, because we know there’s there’s traditional games from all across the world. So we have teams from New Zealand and Mexico. Even Labrador in far eastern Canada is coming. So it’s very much a sporting event, but it’s also a cultural exchange, and that’s a really important aspect of this, is our sports are connected to our culture, and we want to make this an opportunity to learn from each other and learn about the variety of Indigenous games. So on Friday, we’ll have workshops with our Maori guests and our Mexican athletes. I know the Mexican workshop is an Aztec hip ball game where they have a, I think it’s like a 10 pound rubber ball that you hit with your hips. It’s been highlighted in movies like “El Dorado” and such, that’s where I first heard about it.
But it’s pretty cool to think that after all these years, we’re having these international guests come to our event, that it’s really grown into something pretty amazing. So we’re pretty excited.
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Mike Lane: Who participates. I mean, is there an age range?
Kyle Worl: The minimum age is 11, and we have three age categories. We have middle school — which is sixth, seventh and eighth — high school, ninth through 12th. And then we have an open adult category.
Mike Lane: So 11 years old is the Youngest and what’s the oldest?
Kyle Worl: Because we have an adult division, some of the coaches of these high school teams also sign up. I’m not sure who the oldest is, but I’m sure there’s going to be a few people in their 40s, maybe older. Kyle Kaayak’w Worl smiles for a photo at KTOO on Tuesday, April 7, 2026. (Photo by Clarise Larson/KTOO)
Mike Lane: So there’s no ceiling?
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Kyle Worl: No upper age limit. You’re never too old to do the games. And I always say there’s a game for everyone. They’re not all about jumping and kicking, which may get harder with age. We have games like the Dene stick pull, which is a technique based game, and it’s based on grabbing a salmon out of the water. So it’s, it’s more about balance and technique. We have archery too, and there’s a lot of skill to it but it’s not something that’s going to hurt your leg.
Mike Lane: And there’s artwork.
Kyle Worl: Yeah. So we’re really lucky that Corinne James agreed to design our 2026, shirts, and she did a formline design of Nalukataq, which is the blanket toss from the Iñupiaq people. And she did her interpretation in formline. It’s a really beautiful design. It’s going to be on all of our shirts. We have a pin made of it. So we’ve been really lucky to get really amazing Southeast Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian artists to provide us art each year.
A new home under construction in Potter Valley in Anchorage. (Loren Holmes / ADN)
This June, two very different offers reach Alaska families, and both amount to the same thing: $10,000. The difference is everything.
Bill Walker, running for governor, would hand every eligible Alaskan a one-time $10,000 check and then end the Permanent Fund dividend for good. Ask one question: Where does his $10,000 come from?
It comes from the Permanent Fund, the people’s own money and the savings Alaskans built for their children. Walker would spend that endowment once to pay Alaskans to give up the yearly dividend forever.
Think about what that does. It cancels the annual check that gives a family a reason to keep an Alaska address and replaces it with a single payout. You hand people their own savings, call it a gift and cut the tie that held them here in the same motion. It is the oldest mistake in governing money: raid what you have saved to buy a moment’s applause and call the spending generosity.
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A plan that spends the people’s savings to send the people away is not bold. It is foolish.
Now consider the other $10,000. Through Alaska Housing Finance Corp., the state offers families up to $10,000 to build a new, energy-efficient home. AHFC raids nothing. It earns its own way. Over the years, it has returned more than $2 billion to the state treasury, and it spends some of that income the way any good business does: to win a customer.
Here, the customer is an Alaskan who wants to own a home, put down roots and stay.
That is the oldest sound move in business: Invest a little of what you earn to bring in someone who stays. The homeowner remains, the community gains a family and the corporation keeps earning. The money spent comes back. A plan that puts earnings to work to bring people home is not charity. It is clever.
Same amount. Opposite source. Opposite wisdom. One spends savings; the other spends earnings. One pays Alaskans to leave; the other pays them to stay. One empties the state; the other fills it.
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This Homeownership Month, the choice is the size of a single check, and the whole question is where the check comes from and what it asks of you. Ten thousand dollars of your own fund, to wave you goodbye. Or $10,000, earned and reinvested, to help you stay and build.
Evan Swensen is the publisher of Publication Consultants in Anchorage and the author of “What’s the Money For: A Permanent Fund Mortgage Proposal.”
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A man with the same name and party affiliation as Alaska Republican U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan is eligible to challenge the senator in the August primary, a judge ruled Friday.
Superior Court Judge Thomas Matthews’ ruling overturns a June 15 decision by Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher to disqualify the challenger and keep him off the primary ballot. Matthews’ ruling can be appealed to the state Supreme Court.
Attorneys for the state have said Tuesday is the deadline for a final ruling so that ballots for the Aug. 18 primary can be printed.
The judge ruled that the division’s decision to exclude Dan J. Sullivan because his candidacy was not “in good faith” was not based on the Constitution, Alaska law or the division’s own regulations. The retired teacher from the small fishing community of Petersburg filed to challenge the incumbent.
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Dan Sullivan, who has filed to run for U.S. Senate in Alaska, poses for a photo Friday, June 26, 2026, in Petersburg, Alaska.
Katie Holmlund/AP Photo
“Instead, the decision was based upon a new, previously unstated, ‘good faith’ criteria,” the judge wrote.
The division is appealing the decision, Sam Curtis, a spokesperson with the state Department of Law, said by email Saturday. Jeffrey Robinson, an attorney for Dan J. Sullivan, said in an email he expected the division to appeal and couldn’t comment until the Alaska Supreme Court rules on the case.
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The controversy over the two Dan Sullivans has underscored the stakes involved in the incumbent’s reelection campaign. The Alaska race is one of about half a dozen U.S. Senate races expected to be highly competitive in the fall, and the seat is one Democrats are trying to flip in their efforts to try to regain the majority. But it’s expected to be an uphill battle in a state that President Trump won by 13 points in 2024.
The senator and allies, including the National Republican Senatorial Committee, have condemned the challenger’s efforts to join the race, arguing his presence could confuse voters. Republican Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom earlier this month opened an investigation into the non-Senator Sullivan’s candidacy.
Under Alaska’s election system, the top four candidates from the primary, regardless of party, move on to the ranked-choice November general election.
The senator has accused the challenger Sullivan of working with Democrats and the campaign of Democratic former U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola — who is considered the senator’s main opponent — to cause confusion and boost Peltola’s chances. The sitting senator brought the situation to reporters’ attention at the Capitol earlier this month, accusing Democrats of being “complicit in trying to trick Alaskans” to “rig an election in their favor.”
Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, speaks to reporters at the Capitol in Washington, D.C., June 30, 2025.
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Mark Schiefelbein/AP Photo
Peltola’s campaign and state Democrats have denied the allegation, as has the challenger.
Sen. Sullivan and Peltola are the highest-profile candidates in the crowded race and the only ones to report raising any money.
Beecher has said she determined the challenger Sullivan is not eligible to run because his candidacy was not filed in good faith and instead was done with an intent to confuse voters. She said he had registered to vote as Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. and, in conjunction with his candidacy, changed his party affiliation to Republican. She also cited similarities between his campaign website and the senator’s, and his work with a consultant whose clients have included some Democrats. She did not mention finding any evidence of alleged coordination.
In arguing to keep the challenger disqualified, attorneys for the state pushed back on suggestions the ballot could be designed in a way to reduce voter confusion over two candidates with the same name and party running for the same office.
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“The Constitution does not require States to place a sham candidate on the ballot and then attempt to mitigate the damage through design choices,” attorney Rachel Witty, with the Alaska Department of Law, and outside attorneys Christopher Murray and Michael Francisco wrote in court filings.
Attorneys for the challenger Sullivan argued that the Constitution lays out three exclusive qualifications for the Senate, addressing only age, citizenship and residency. They said Beecher lacked the legal authority to boot their client off the ballot.
The challenger Sullivan has said that sharing a name and party affiliation with the incumbent gave him “an instant megaphone.” But the 69-year-old retired teacher and former U.S. Forest Service employee said he had considered a run for some time and had grown frustrated with the senator.
He initially was certified on the state’s candidate list as Dan J. Sullivan, with the senator listed as Dan S. Sullivan and identified as the incumbent.
