On June 1, 2026, former Alaska Gov. Bill Walker (I) filed to run for governor, an office he left in 2018. Walker previously ran for governor in 2022, coming in third place, receiving 21% of the vote behind Les Gara’s (D) 24% and incumbent Mike Dunleavy’s (R) 50%.
Walker is not the first former governor to run again. In research dating back to 1960, Ballotpedia found at least 135 instances in which 102 governors ran for non-consecutive terms, with some governors running more than once. In Alaska, the state has the second-highest number of candidacies with 10 instances across nine elections. The earliest recorded instance was in 1962 when former territorial governor Mike Stepovich (R) ran for governor of the state, but was defeated by William Egan (D). In 1974, two former governors ran against each other.