Barrier-breaking Alaska congresswoman copes with personal tragedy as she faces tough reelection bid

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — Alannah Hurley still gets choked up recalling Democrat Mary Peltola’s election to Alaska’s only U.S. House seat in 2022. Hurley, like Peltola, is Yup’ik and called Peltola's election — in which she became the first Alaska Native in Congress — monumental for Hurley and her daughters.

“Finally, we have somebody in Congress who looks like us, talks like us, grew up like us, and they have lived experience, understanding the beauty and the challenges of what it means to be Native in this state and the nation,” Hurley said.

Peltola, 51, is in a tough reelection fight against Republican Nick Begich in a high-stakes race that could help determine whether Republicans or Democrats control the House. The campaign follows a year of intense personal tragedy for the lawmaker, who lost her mother and her husband, Eugene Peltola, within a four-month span in 2023.

Peltola called the weeks around her husband's death in a small plane crash some of the most difficult of her life. She returned to Washington about a month later, arriving amid a period of Republican infighting over the House speakership. She said then that it was a difficult time for the country, too, and that she was “ready to get to work.”

While Peltola has not spoken much publicly about navigating her grief in the glare of the public eye, people who know her well say they've been struck by her resilience.

“When I think about how Mary just kind of kept her head up throughout everything that she has gone through in the past couple years, I’m extraordinarily proud of her,” said Alaska’s senior U.S. senator, Republican Lisa Murkowski, who first met Peltola about 25 years ago when they were in the state legislature and they bonded as moms with boys.

“She was not allowed to grieve the way that most...