A last-minute candidate joined the race for the House District 5, which covers Kodiak, Seward and Cordova.
Leighton Radner is a hotel auditor from Seward. He announced his candidacy on Facebook one day before the June 1 deadline. Radner previously ran for Seward City Council in 2021, but has not held public office before.
Radner said he’s running in order to better represent the people in the district. In addition to wanting to address infrastructure that he says the state hasn’t maintained, people across the district have begun reaching out to him with their concerns.
“The state and federal government, primarily the federal government, should not really have a say,” he said, “If these people in Seward, Kodiak, or any of these areas, want things done, then they should be done, and I think representatives have to represent what the people want. And I think that's something that is certainly been lacking for a while, not only in this district, but in many of them.”
Radner is originally from Big Lake in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, but he has many family ties to Seward. He moved there about 7 years ago.
Radner is part of the Alaska Libertarian Party as its communications director. He plans to run on libertarian values of reducing government control.
“Most of my, kind of campaign will be run on libertarian issues for certain, but I think those issues are like-minded with the people who are here in the district, because I think ultimately, the libertarian perspective is a perspective of less government. And I think that is an Alaskan perspective, historically,” he said.
Radner is the only person running against incumbent Louise Stutes, a Kodiak Republican who has been in office since 2015.
On the southern Kenai Peninsula, four candidates are running for House District 6, which includes Kasilof, Homer and Seldovia.
Incumbent Sarah Vance is a Homer Republican who has served in office since 2019. Running against her is Dawson Slaughter, a Republican from Anchor Point.
Two nonpartisan candidates are also running for Vance’s seat. Alana Greear is a teacher at Kachemak-Selo School east of Homer. Brent Johnson is a longtime commercial setnet fisherman from Clam Gulch. Johnson is also the Kenai Peninsula Borough Assembly President.
The state primary election will take place August 20.
