Ben Mallott takes the helm at Alaska Federation of Natives

Longtime AFN President Julie Kitka announced her retirement from the organization earlier this year. A search commenced for a new leader. Now, AFN Vice President Ben Mallott, 38, has been named president.

Mallott, of Juneau, is the son of the late Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott of Yakutat and retired schoolteacher Toni Mallott, originally of Rampart. He is a board member for various nonprofits, including being chairman of the Alaska Humanities Forum, a trustee of the Nature Conservancy Alaska and on the board of the Alaska Native Heritage Center. Mallott is a graduate of Oregon State University and has a master’s degree from American University.

Prior to working for AFN, he served as a legislative assistant for U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski on federal policy areas relating to Alaska Natives and rural Alaska. He is vice chair of NTVI, an 8(a) subsidiary of Baan O Yeel Kon Corporation.

The appointment of Mallott comes at a time when AFN had taken a sharp turn toward radical leftist politics under Kitka, who ran the organization for 33 years. In doing so, it lost some important Alaska Native corporations that left AFN due to policy differences, including Arctic Slope Regional Corporation, Doyon and the Aleut Corporation. Tlingit Haida Central Council, the largest federally recognized tribe in Alaska, also dropped from AFN.

When Doyon left AFN and later rejoined, it published a statement outlining its concerns and actions it had taken to try to correct the course of AFN:

“Doyon’s decision to withdraw from AFN was made by the Doyon Board of Directors after significant deliberation and after a long history of sharing our concerns with AFN leadership. Doyon engaged with AFN for over a decade, sharing our concerns and advocating for continued improvement in the AFN organization, decision-making, and services provided to its members; these requests were all made well prior to the decision to withdraw.” The entire statement is at this link.

Byron Mallott, Ben’s late father, served as president of the AFN and received a “Citizen of the Year” award from the organization. Ben Mallott’s brother Anthony Mallott served as president of the Sealaska Corporation until January of this year.

Governed by a 38-member board, the Alaska Federation of Natives is the largest statewide Native organization in Alaska, whose membership includes 179 federally recognized tribes, 154 village corporations, 9 regional corporations, and 10 regional nonprofit and tribal consortiums that contract and compact to run federal and state programs.