As Republicans fight to maintain their narrow majority in Congress, they face a unique challenge in Alaska – not from a Democrat, but from an independent commercial fisher and first-time candidate running to flip the state’s lone House seat.

Bill Hill, who is an Alaska Native and has worked in education and construction, has positioned himself as a working-class candidate who will fight to make life more affordable for people like himself and his family.

Like voters across the country, Alaskans are deeply worried about affordability and rising cost of basic necessities. Hill counts himself among the voters who have felt squeezed by high fuel prices driven up by Donald Trump’s war on Iran.

“When the spring fuel barge showed up in my home town of Naknek this spring, I went from paying $118 to fill my truck up to over $200,” Hill said. “Our gas went from $6.70 a gallon to almost $9 a gallon.”

Hill’s campaign to unseat the Republican congressman Nick Begich has gained momentum in the final weeks before the 3 November election, as national Democrats line up behind him and ad spending ramps up. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report recently shifted the race from “likely Republican” to “leans Republican”, with the district favoring Republicans by 6%.

Recent polls showed Hill trailing Begich by single digits, but Hill’s support grows when voters learn more about his background, as he works to boost his name recognition. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee added the race to its coveted “red to blue” program in September.

Hill has not specified whether he would caucus with Democrats if elected. This cycle, he is among several independents challenging Republicans in red states, including Senate candidates Dan Osborn in Nebraska and Todd Achilles in Idaho.

In Alaska, Begich may benefit from being the only Republican in the four-way general election contest run under the state’s ranked-choice system. Polls suggest support for Democrat Eric Hafner, who is serving time in a federal prison in New York and has no apparent links to the state, could complicate Hill’s path.

Hill has staked his campaign on his ability to personally relate to the economic pain and frustrations of his fellow Alaskans.

“I have spent a life being in the ditches, in the school hallways, on the back decks of fishing boats with hard-working people, running a small business like so many Alaskans do, and I know what the struggles and challenges that we face are,” Hill said. “I also know what our hopes and dreams are.”

He noted the cost of heating fuel nearly doubled, from $4.50 a gallon to $8.30, while price increases in some of Alaska’s more remote villages have soared even higher. In places such as Ambler and Shungnak, Indigenous villages that sit along the Kobuk River near the Arctic circle, the price of a gallon of gas has surpassed $25.

“This is crushing Alaskans,” Hill said. “We are feeling the crunch every single day.”

More than one in three Alaskan households aren’t earning enough income to cover housing, food, childcare and other essential expenses, according to a report by the United Way of Anchorage and Alaska 211 published earlier this month.

In 2024, Begich, the conservative son of a prominent Democratic family in Alaska, narrowly ousted the incumbent Democrat, Mary Peltola, who is currently running for US Senate. Though Trump won the state by a resounding 13%, Begich prevailed by just 2.4%.

Like Peltola, Hill is a supporter of gun rights, in line with Alaska’s strong hunting tradition, and is a supporter of both the oil industry and the renewable energy industry.

Hill cited the impacts on Alaskans of cuts to the Snap nutrition-assistance program and Medicaid, the expiration of Affordable Care Act tax credits, Trump’s tariffs, federal job losses in Alaska, and the cancellation of several Alaskan renewable energy projects by the Trump administration as contributing factors to added costs facing Alaskans, with many of the cuts enacted by the president’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act set to go into effect in 2027.

“It is getting very, very difficult for working people in Alaska to get by,” Hill said, charging that his opponent was a “multimillionaire working for billionaires”.

With his reported assets valued at $119,000, Hill has sought to highlight the vast wealth gap between himself and his opponent, who’s worth at least $7.4m. “He’s somebody who doesn’t represent the everyday Alaskan in his work,” Hill added.

Begich’s office did not respond to multiple requests for comment, but previously denied his wealth affects his voting record.

“Congressman Begich’s personal finances have no impact on his legislative decisionmaking process,” Silver Prout, a spokesperson for Begich’s congressional office, told the Anchorage Press in an email.

Begich praised the passage of Trump’s One Big beautiful Bill Act, calling it a “transformative victory”, and has continued supporting Trump’s war in Iran.

Hill, a Dena’ina Athabascan Native Alaskan, has worked as a commercial fisherman since he was eight years old and continues to do so. He has also worked union construction jobs with Laborers’ Local 341, and worked for 25 years in education as a union member teacher, principal and school district superintendent.

Alaska has one of the highest union density rates in the US. As of 2025, 18.1% of all workers in the state were union members, the third highest rate in the US, behind Hawaii and New York.

More than 20 labor organizations, including the Alaska AFL-CIO, have endorsed Hill’s campaign. Begich, meanwhile, has signed on to the National Right to Work Act and has a 0% lifetime voting score by the AFL-CIO, the largest federation of labor unions in the US.

“Unions need more support in Congress, and we see attacks on trying to tear down their power in this nation,” Hill said. “At the end of the day, unions built the middle class of this country, and they’re the ones who can do it again.”