Lieutenant Governor Kevin Meyer discusses elections, misinformation

FAIRBANKS, Alaska (KTVF) - With the 2022 special election and regular primary coming up on August 16, Lieutenant Governor Kevin Meyer, who supervises the Division of Elections (DOE), held a press conference on Wednesday, August 10.

He was joined by other members of his staff, including Gail Fenumiai, Director of the DOE.

Meyer discussed various issues heading into next week’s election, including staffing at polling places, and a schedule for results to be available.

According to Fenumiai, the goal of the DOE is to have the first set of results from early voting available by 9:00 p.m. on election night.

However, the results will continue to be counted in the days following the election and the target date for certification of the primary is September 2.

The Lieutenant Governor said the voter turnout for early voting so far has been high compared to the last midterm in 2018.

He discussed efforts by the DOE on educating citizens about ranked choice voting and also addressed misinformation about the elections. ”This is not a vote by mail election. We did a vote-by-mail for the special primary, but again, voting by mail is illegal. State statute requires us to do in-person voting unless it is a special election.“ ”All the ballots are paper. They always have been, and again they will be. There is no Internet voting. There is no voting by machine.”

The Lieutenant Governor also discussed Dominion voting machines, which figured prominently in controversies surrounding the 2020 election. “We always had Dominion, since even back in the 1990s. I think it might’ve been called something else in the 1990s, but we’ve always had Dominion, and they worked quite well for us. They’re all tested.”

He added, “Just to make sure that they’re all working correctly, state law requires us, and we do, take one precinct from each district and we recount that to make sure it matched what the tabulator says.”

Early voting is available for the August 16 regular primary and special election. In Fairbanks, that can be done at the State of Alaska Fairbanks Regional Office Building at 675 7th Avenue.

More information and educational materials about the new voting system can be found on the Division of Elections website.

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