ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – African American civil rights leaders from Washington, Oregon and Alaska gathered Saturday on the University of Alaska Anchorage campus to workshop their next steps as an organization.

Members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, NAACP, met at UAA for an annual convention that started with events Friday night. There were multiple workshops on Saturday that went over organizational structure and training. Keynote speakers included Celeste Hodge Growden, president and CEO of the Alaska Black Caucus, and Gyasi Ross

NAACP members traveled to Anchorage for a yearly convention that began with a reception Friday. Saturday multiple workshops on organizational structure and member training were accompanied by keynote speakers Celeste Hodge Growden of the Alaska Black Caucus and indigenous storyteller and educator Gyasi Ross.

“We train on what do we need to do for the fight ahead?” said Sheley Secrest, president of the NAACP state conference of Alaska, Oregon and Washington. “Right now, for the upcoming presidential election, we’re making certain that we have our grand troops out, hitting every single street, because we need to make certain that we’re turning out the black vote.”

NAACP members said on Saturday their intent is on training successors in the civil rights movement and also to simultaneously welcome non-members to join.

“I get very, very excited when we talk about youth and the opportunities that these great minds of the future can bring to not only the legacy of NAACP, but how they’re going to level us up and take these challenges head on,” said Cheryl Cox Williams, president of NAACP Anchorage.

Cox Williams explained in one of her presentations Saturday how the local branch of the NAACP engages African Americans in Anchorgae with matters of health, voting, education, economics, crime and on future generations.

“Once we’re finished training, once we’re finished working, we’re going to make certain that we have a good time,” said Secrest.

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ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – Twenty-four service members and first responders honored the lives of those who died during the 9/11 terrorist attacks, during Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson’s first annual 9/11 memorial stair climb Saturday on base.

Nicholas Parks, a firefighter and EMT on JBER, was one of the organizers for the event. He said he’s wanted to do a memorial stair climb like this for the past year or so on base.

“We want to make sure they’re not forgotten,” said Parks.

That dream became a reality as service members and first responders climbed 110 flights of stairs in honor of those who died during the 9/11 terrorist attacks. There ceremony remembers those who died that day as well as the thousands of people who continue to face ongoing health complications linked to the 2001 attacks.

“We’re here today to just serve them, honor them, respect them and celebrate their lives,” said U.S. Air Force Airman 1st Class Jahleel Natta-Haynes.

For 20-year-old Natta-Haynes that means thinking about his first-grade teacher, Ms. Morales, whose father died in the towers during the attacks.

“It showed me that, wow, even though I wasn’t there, people go through things, so history is very important,” said Natta-Haynes said. “I’ll be thinking of her about her just see show love to him and her family.”

JBER’s 9/11 event served as a platform to remember the fallen and as a moment for comradery among first responders.

“It has happened and another emergency will happen, we keep in mind that it’s important to be out here, climbing the stairs and working with each other,” said Parks.

Parks said he plans to continue to have a memorial stair climbs to honor 9/11.

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Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris only trails Republican nominee former President Donald Trump by single digits in Alaska, a state that a Democratic presidential hopeful hasn’t won in six decades.

The last time a Democratic presidential candidate won Alaska was President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964—exactly 60 years ago. The GOP has won the state in every presidential election since then, carrying the state by comfortable double-digit margins in recent cycles.

Trump’s margin did shrink in Alaska between 2016 and 2020. In his first election against Hillary Clinton, he carried the state by nearly 15 points, but that went down to a lead of 10 points when he was up against President Joe Biden. Notably, Alaskans bucked Trump’s favored Senate and House candidates in the 2022 midterm election.

Democratic Representative Mary Peltola and anti-Trump GOP Senator Lisa Murkowski won their races despite Trump endorsing their opponents and campaigning against them. They were buoyed by Alaska’s new ranked-choice voting system, in which voters get to list and rank multiple options for each office on the ballot.

Newsweek reached out to the Trump and Harris campaigns for comment via email on Saturday morning.

What the Alaska Poll Shows

New polling conducted by Alaska Survey Research from September 11 to 12, after the ABC News debate between Harris and Trump, showed the Democrat down by 5 points with likely voters in the northwestern state. Harris had the support of 42 percent of respondents, whereas Trump had the backing of 47 percent.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was running as an independent but endorsed Trump in late August, received 5 percent support. An additional 6 percent said they were still undecided. Sixty-seven percent of respondents said they had watched the debate between Harris and Trump, with 52 percent saying Harris had won.

The poll included 1,254 likely Alaskan voters. The margin of error and confidence level were not posted with the results.

With ranked-choice voting, those who list Kennedy Jr. as their first choice could select Harris or Trump as their second choice on the ballot. Their votes would then be redistributed in a second round of counting, assuming Kennedy Jr. would be eliminated in the first round. Several other presidential hopefuls, including Libertarian contender Chase Oliver and Green Party candidate Jill Stein, have qualified to be on the ballot in Alaska.

Nate Silver Weighs In

Nate Silver, the founder of the Silver Bulletin polling analysis, shared the polling on Substack on Friday, noting that his model has been “bullish” on Harris’ chances of winning Alaska.

“LOL, Silver Bulletin model had been randomly bullish on D chances in Alaska even before this poll. Just 3 electoral votes so unlikely to matter, but 8th-highest state in our Voter Power Index (impact per marginal vote),” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Silver previously founded the prominent FiveThirtyEight polling analysis site, which is now owned by ABC News. He parted ways with ABC and FiveThirtyEight in 2023.

What National and Swing State Polling Shows

Nationally, Harris appears to be narrowly ahead of Trump. Silver’s polling average shows the vice president with 48.3 percent support compared to the former president’s 46.2 percent. FiveThirtyEight’s average shows Harris with 48.1 percent and Trump with 45.4 percent.

In the critical swing states, Harris narrowly leads Trump in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, according to Silver’s average. Meanwhile, Trump leads in Georgia and Arizona, with the candidates tied in North Carolina and Nevada.

Meanwhile, FiveThirtyEight has Harris up by slim margins in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Nevada and Wisconsin. Trump is narrowly ahead in Arizona and Georgia, while FiveThirtyEight shows the candidates tied in North Carolina.