Alaska
Part 1: A
The current governor of Alaska is Mike Dunleavy. He is a republican who defeated democrat March Begich during the 2018 gubernatorial election. There is a discourse going on about who the speaker of the house will be for Alaska. The nominee was a Republican named David Talerico, who just yesterday (Kitchenman, 2019) was one vote short of becoming the speaker of the house. No secondary election has yet been announced. The president of the Alaska Senate is Republican Cathy Giessel and the Senate Majority leader is Mia Costello, also a Republican. There are 20 seats in the Alaskan senate. 13 are held by Republicans and 7 are held by the Democrats. There are 40 seats in the House of Representatives, 16 are Democratic, 23 are Republican and 1 is independent. In both cases, the majorities are Republican. This is conducive to an active and achievable legislative agenda, especially under the leadership of a Republican governor. The unity in the state of Alaska behind the Republican party should lead to success for the state legislature.
Part 1:B
The state legislature has placed a few key issues for the upcoming weeks. The Senate Finance Committee met the 24th of January to reconcile issues with the Alaskan Oil and Gas commision, Census accuracy issues, Labor and workforce development (W3.akleg.gov, 2019). In his state of the Senate address, Mike Dunleavy outlined his agenda as governor: He called for a war on criminals, balance the budget, protect private investment security, create jobs and grow the economy, and restore trust in elected government officials (Remarks, 2019). These goals are outlined by the Juneau tribune in just their top 3 stories for Jan. 23rd (Juneau Empire, 2019). Alaska is looking to fix its budget, to which a deficient of 1.6 Billion dollars that was found in the initial budget proposed by Mike Dunleavy. Another concern was the 4 new crime bills that are the initial steps in the war on crime. Under a unified Republican government, the legislature of Alaska should have little issue in enacting its policies.
Part 2:A
The Ohio Senator who represents me is Steve Wilson and the Representative is Tom Brinkman. Steve Wilson was assigned to a committee for Education, Insurance and Financial institutions, Public safety, and the Ways and Means committee. He voted to ban abortions after the detection of a heartbeat. He established a database for violent offenders and was endorsed by the NRA. Tom Brinkman Jr. also voted for the bill that prohibits abortion after a heartbeat. He also amended education laws for primary schools, and signed a bill that prevents the coercion of marriage ceremonies against the beliefs of a licensed minister. Overall these two statesmen do represent my well. Both align with the Republican party which is the avenue for conservative ideals that I believe in. Specifically relating to abortion, gun laws and religious freedom.
Works Cited
Juneau Empire. (2019). Alaska Legislature | Juneau Empire. [online] Available at: https://www.juneauempire.com/tag/alaska-legislature/ [Accessed 25 Jan. 2019].
W3.akleg.gov. (2019). Alaska State Legislature. [online] Available at: http://w3.akleg.gov/index.php?tab2#tab2 [Accessed 25 Jan. 2019].
Remarks, S. (2019). 2019 State of the State Address – Michael J. Dunleavy. [online] Gov.alaska.gov. Available at: https://gov.alaska.gov/newsroom/2019/01/22/2019-state-of-the-state-address/ [Accessed 25 Jan. 2019].