About the Founder
Ward Sattler
Educator. Bush Pilot. Alaskan. Father.
Ward Sattler with his daughter, Congresswoman Mary Peltola
A Lifetime in Alaska.
One Historic Daughter.
Ward Sattler came to Alaska not for opportunity but for purpose. A Colorado State University graduate, he headed north to teach in Fort Yukon — one of the state's most remote communities, reachable only by air — at a time when bush Alaska meant genuine isolation and genuine reward. He never left. Over the decades he became a licensed bush pilot, raising his family in the kind of landscape that shapes people differently than anywhere else in America.
Ward's connection to Alaska's political life runs deep. He served as a staffer to Representative Don Young, the longest-serving Republican in congressional history and a towering figure in Alaska public life. The two men were friends — and when Don Young died in 2022, the loss was felt across every corner of the state he had served for nearly five decades. Ward understood that world from the inside: the coalition-building, the constituent relationships, the pragmatic bipartisanship that defined Young's long tenure.
Growing up alongside that friendship, Mary traveled to campaign events with her father — absorbing, from childhood, what it meant to earn trust across a state as vast and varied as Alaska. That quality — a disarming, genuine warmth that cuts through partisan noise — became what observers would later call her political superpower. Ward saw it first.
"Alaska has always known how to pick leaders who put the land and the people first. Mary is that leader."
Mary's path was shaped not only by her father but by the full breadth of her Alaska family. The passing of her mother, Lizann Williams, in 2023 was a reminder of the deep roots and real relationships that ground Mary's public life — and the people who made her who she is.
With more than fifty years in Alaska's sociopolitical landscape, Ward Sattler founded Aurora PAC from a place of conviction, not calculation. He watched his daughter make history as the first Alaska Native elected to Congress. Now he believes she belongs in the Senate — and that this moment, for Alaska and for the country, is one worth fighting for.
Confessions of a Never Trumper
I can't say for sure when I became a Never Trumper. I am sure I was one before the term was elucidated. I knew of his television thing "The Apprentice" from mentions in newspapers and radio. Not being a watcher of television I have never seen his show, but I had heard of his famous line, "You're fired." I had never thought seriously about him — he was just another entertainer that I wasn't interested in.
Then he announced his candidacy for POTUS and made his grand appearance — just like a debutante at her coming out. I saw it on the news feeds on my Chromebook.
Every four years there are two things on television that I can't bear to miss — the Olympic Games and the presidential campaign debates. Even back in my university days I was glued to a radio for the debates, and I would drive the two hundred miles back to my aunt and uncle's cattle ranch in Nebraska just to listen and watch with them.
I got my degree in History and Economics, then went to North Africa, and then to a position as a staffer to a Republican Representative in the U.S. House of Representatives, where I was a neophyte observer to the Nixon Watergate debacle. I remain a strict constructionist believer in the U.S. Constitution. (Which I have read, by the way.)
As a neophyte staffer I early learned that compromise is at the heart of our constitutional system of balances of power, and that there is an elemental struggle between the need for fiscal responsibility and the need to address the constantly growing demands of a developing nation.
I didn't take Trump's candidacy very seriously; I saw it as a diversion. Then I saw and heard his diatribe on Senator McCain. To me Senator McCain was the embodiment of the best principles of compromise legislation. I was also aware of his long service to his country, and that of his father and grandfather. Like recent Presidents George H. W. Bush, John Kennedy, and Dwight Eisenhower, he had served his country with distinction; like President George H. W. Bush he had been shot down in action over enemy territory — and beyond those, he had been held in enemy captivity and tortured to the point of suffering long term physical disability. After five years in captivity he came home as a hero and a patriot in the greatest of American tradition.
Then he is denigrated on the national stage by a man who bragged about his battle to avoid venereal disease while the men were away fighting America's battle. How could this buffoon, as president, hope to work with congress after such a callous, puerile attack on one of the most accomplished leaders of the party he purports to represent? How could he hope to accomplish anything of substance when he evidences such callow ignorance?
Then, soon after, in another public debate, journalist Megyn Kelly asked him why he was so denigratory to women — a logical question to my mind. Trump exploded, feigning outrage that a journalist should ask such an inappropriate question. "There's blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever." That was in response to her question: "You've called women you don't like 'fat pigs, dogs, slobs and disgusting animals.'" How can one defend such juvenile crudeness?
July 28, 2016 — Khizr Khan, father of a son killed in combat in Iraq, was speaking on the national stage questioning Trump's comprehension of the U.S. Constitution. Rather than respond to Mr. Khan, Trump attacked Mrs. Khan, who was standing silently next to her husband on the stage. "If you look at his wife, she was standing there. She had nothing to say. She probably, maybe she wasn't allowed to have anything to say." Later she explained: "When I saw my son's picture on stage, I couldn't take it, and I controlled myself at that time." Empathy, empathy — what is that?
The term "never trumper" came into being. I was one before the term evolved.
His shallow superficiality apparently resonated with a certain class of people — bitter and angry about their perceived loss of privileged status in a changing world. The electoral college, in a reversal of its intended purpose, granted an ignorant buffoon the presidency. As Kurt Vonnegut said, "And So It Goes."
That was all three or four years ago. Acquaintances of mine said, "It's just campaign rhetoric; when he's in office it will change, he will become presidential, just give him a chance." How long does it take? It doesn't matter, he will have advisors to guide his decisions. Condoleezza Rice, for whom I have the utmost respect, advised him to select Rex Tillerson for his Secretary of State. Trump accepted that advice. It was a selection with promise. Maybe it can happen. Tillerson: "Trump is a moron."
Three years have proven that Trump can't take advice. "Briefing papers are just words. I trust my gut." Flatulence, anybody?
And I haven't even started on the frightening implications of the psychological undertones. What is his obsessive preoccupation with blood and uncleanliness — particularly female blood and uncleanliness? What is the root of his fear of women? Why can he only appreciate inflatable dolls? I suspect that his betrayal of the Kurds is related to the role Kurdish women played in the Peshmerga battles with ISIS. "With the worldwide coverage of the war against ISIS, Kurdish female fighters have emerged as popular figures for their effectiveness and bravery in battle. Leading by example, they have inspired millions of people around the world." Trump can't deal with this.
And back to John McCain — does Trump have deep seated questions about his own masculinity? Does he need to prove something about himself which he instinctively knows is unprovable? His sensitivity to matters involving himself, contrasted to his insensitivity to others? The desperate need to denigrate others in a futile attempt to bolster his own ego. This is a psychologically dangerous person: unstable, insecure, desperately craving attention and demanding adoration. How long before the power this aberration wields will create a catastrophe?
Yes, I am a Never Trumper.
— Ward Sattler, January 3, 2020
Join Ward in Supporting Mary
Aurora PAC exists because one Alaskan — who has spent a lifetime here — believes his daughter can change the Senate. If you share that conviction, now is the time to act on it.
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