It appears there will be an election rematch next year for the southern Southeast seat in the state House of Representatives. On December 15, Republican Jeremy Bynum filed to run for the District 1 seat currently held by Ketchikan independent Representative Dan Ortiz.
Bynum is the manager of Ketchikan Public Utilities’ electric division. He is originally from Oregon and moved to Ketchikan in 2016. He ran as a Republican against the unaffiliated incumbent Ortiz for the same state House seat back in 2022 and lost by a narrow margin – a little under 350 votes. Bynum is direct about his alignment with what he calls “Republican values.”
“I think that just because you have an ‘R’ next to your name, doesn’t mean you’re not able to work with other people. I think that it’s really about creating relationships and being open to ideas. And I know that with a polarization of politics in the last eight years or so that maybe more that the idea of being in a party affiliation is a bad thing. And I don’t see it as a bad thing, I see it as an opportunity to align with a set of ideals,” said Bynum.
Bynum also currently serves on the Ketchikan Borough Assembly. He was reelected to another three-year term on the Assembly in October. If sworn in, Bynum would have to resign from the Assembly. He said he would likely have to do the same for his role at the public utility.
The candidate said he is passionate about improving funding for the Alaska Marine Highway and state education systems, both of which he says are in crisis.
Bynum shares a focus on ferries and education with incumbent Rep. Dan Ortiz, who retired from teaching at Ketchikan High School in 2014.
According to Bynum, fisheries, housing, and renewable energies will also be areas of focus in his campaign.
“I think that Alaska is situated to be a leader in renewables, specifically waterpower, and that would be in the form of hydropower and tidal energy in the United States. And if not just the United States, the world,” Bynum declared. “When I look into our future, we’ve built success in Alaska, based off of our oil and gas assets. Some of our mining. I think that this asset that we have available to us in the form of waterpower is a tremendous asset.”
When asked why he thinks he is the right person for the job, Bynum said Alaska is facing many challenges and he believes he has a diverse background in problem solving.
“And I don’t want to take anything away from our current representation of what they’ve tried to accomplish for District 1. I just say that I come from a different background, I have different world experiences. And I approach things in a little bit of a different manner,” the KPU division manager added.
Grant EchoHawk, a fellow borough assemblymember, announced his intent to run for the House seat in August but as of Dec. 19, has not officially filed for candidacy.
The deadline for filing for candidacy is June 1 and election day is August 20, 2024.
