The Alaska Legislature rejected Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s pick for attorney general, Stephen Cox, on a 29-31 vote Thursday morning, an extraordinary rebuke of the governor’s appointment to head the Department of Law.
Democratic lawmakers in the House and Senate said they were concerned about a range of controversial choices Cox has made since his appointment in August 2025. Several pointed to amicus briefs Alaska has authored or joined during Cox’s tenure.
Thursday’s vote was only the second rejection of a commissioner-level appointment in state history. The last was during the Palin administration.
Sen. Löki Tobin, an Anchorage Democrat, highlighted a brief Cox signed onto supporting the Trump administration’s effort to sharply restrict birthright citizenship and said Cox had spent his time as attorney general “fighting Lower 48 culture wars.”
“The attorney general is not any one individual's lawyer,” Tobin said. “He is our lawyer. His responsibility is to fight for every Alaskan.”
Shortly after lawmakers voted down Cox as attorney general, Dunleavy issued a statement saying he had appointed Cox to a new post he described as “counsel to the governor.” The governor’s office said in a news release Cox would advise Dunleavy on a “wide range of legal, regulatory, and constitutional matters” facing the state.
Dunleavy said Cori Mills, a senior attorney at the Department of Law, would take over as acting attorney general.
Though lawmakers occasionally vote down appointments to lower-level boards and commissions, it is exceedingly rare for lawmakers to reject a governor’s appointee to head a cabinet-level department. The Legislature approved Dunleavy’s four other commissioners up for confirmation Thursday in unanimous or near-unanimous votes.
Opponents of Cox’s confirmation included nearly every Democrat and independent member of the Legislature, except Bethel Sen. Lyman Hoffman. Republican members of the bipartisan House and Senate majority caucuses were split.
Every member of the Republican minority caucuses, with the exception of Anchorage Rep. Mia Costello, voted to confirm Cox.
During confirmation hearings, Democratic lawmakers highlighted other controversies, including Cox’s advice to the Division of Elections to comply with a U.S. Department of Justice request to turn over Alaska’s unredacted voter rolls. Civil rights groups are challenging the decision in court.
Many minority Republicans defended Cox, including Big Lake Republican Rep. Kevin McCabe, who said Cox was simply carrying out the governor’s priorities.
“I suspect that a lot of what we are talking about here is not some rogue attorney general off on his own. I think that he's had direction,” McCabe said. “He's doing a certain number of things that his boss is telling him to do.”
Other Republicans commended his character, saying they’d been impressed with him in one-on-one interviews. Rep. Julie Coulombe, an Anchorage Republican, said she was grateful for a joint effort between the state and the municipality of Anchorage targeting retail theft, public disorder and drug use.
“AG Cox was vital to making that connection between the governor and resources for the Department of Law to come help our city, and I really, really appreciate that from him,” Coulombe said.
Even so, Rep. Andrew Gray, an Anchorage Democrat who chairs the House’s judiciary committee, said Cox’s record during his brief time in office made him a poor choice to head the Department of Law.
“Stephen Cox is a nice person. His children and my child share a piano teacher,” Gray said. “I believe that Stephen Cox would make, probably, a good attorney general in a state. Just not in our state.”
This is a developing story.
