JUNEAU — Mike Chenault, the Republican speaker of the Alaska House, might have the toughest job in the Legislature.
As lawmakers finish their first week of overtime without a deal on the state budget or major deficit reduction legislation, the House majority Chenault leads is sandwiched between the hard-right GOP-led majority in the Senate and the Democratic minority in the House. A session-ending compromise will likely involve all three groups, since the House Democrats hold an effective veto over major legislative priorities because of their power to block spending from a key state savings account.
But the biggest challenge for Chenault this year may be managing his own Republican-led caucus, with 26 members including four rural Democrats from northern and western Alaska, moderate Republicans from Anchorage and coastal communities and tea party conservatives from the Mat-Su and outside Fairbanks.
The diverse majority already showed cracks last year, when six moderate members — who branded themselves the "Musk Ox Coalition" — rebelled against a budget-balancing plan that would have gone around minority Democrats but risked reducing Alaskans' dividend checks.
This year there's even more pressure as members debate how to fix a budget deficit that has grown to $4 billion, with politically unpalatable options that include a restructuring of the $53 billion Permanent Fund that pays residents' dividends.
"I don't envy the speaker," said John Harris, Chenault's immediate predecessor who retired in 2010 and is now a lobbyist. "Trying to bring all these parties together is a monumental task."
Chenault, a construction company executive first elected in 2000, is in his fourth two-year term as speaker. After he led through a period of high oil prices when the state was flush with revenue, the recent crash has blown a hole in the budget and deprived legislative leaders of the money for capital projects that could be used as carrots or sticks to prod rank-and-file members.
Chenault also hasn't said whether he'll seek a fifth term as speaker, which some lawmakers say has set off scrambling and speculation about who will replace him, with the discussions distracting from the Legislature's work.
"The Democrats are having them. The Musk Ox are having them. I hear them in the hallway," said Rep. Lora Reinbold, R-Eagle River, who was kicked out of the House majority last year for breaking a caucus rule requiring her to vote for the state budget. "They've tried to engage me — I'm not getting engaged."
The divisions in Chenault's caucus have figured prominently in the stalled House debate over changes to the state's oil tax system, which legislative leaders say is holding up progress on the budget and other deficit-reduction proposals.
Gov. Bill Walker introduced a bill early this year to sharply cut back the state's tax credit program that's set to pay $775 million in cash subsidies next year to small oil and gas companies.
But the legislation was weakened, then strengthened by majority-led committees before being pulled off the floor because it lacked the 21 votes to pass the 40-member House.
Some of the right-wing members of Chenault's own majority weren't going to support the legislation, saying it scaled back on the cash subsidies too quickly and would jeopardized Southcentral Alaska's supply of natural gas. And some moderate members, like Juneau GOP Rep. Cathy Munoz, said the oil tax legislation didn't go far enough to bolster state revenue when oil prices are low.
There are similar splits within the majority when it comes to other bills, like the one to restructure the Permanent Fund to help pay for state government — slicing the size of Alaskans' dividends in the process.
"I think there are 60 factions right now," said Rep. Shelley Hughes, R-Palmer, referring to the total population of the House and Senate. "Everyone has a different conversation to get to a solution."
Chenault said in an interview that the disagreements within his caucus are to be expected when lawmakers are debating such complex and topics problems as oil taxes and the future of the Permanent Fund.
"They're tough issues," Chenault said.
He also downplayed the idea that the uncertainty about his own position is distracting his caucus from its work, or making it easier for members to defy him.
"I don't rule with an iron first — never have," Chenault said. He added: "The reason I've been the speaker for eight years is because my members have asked me to be the speaker. Some days I think, 'Yeah, I could do it again.' But other days I think somebody else needs to take these reins."
Officials in Chenault's own party, however, have already begun discussing the potential succession plans in the House, more than six months before the next election.
The Alaska Republicans' communications director, Suzanne Downing, sent an April 8 memo to party leaders in which she described how the House majority's power center had shifted away from Chenault and toward Fairbanks Republican Rep. Steve Thompson, who co-chairs the House Finance Committee.
Downing wouldn't release a copy of the memo, which was first reported by political blogger Casey Reynolds. But Downing said it described how a new alignment behind Thompson appeared to come at the expense of some of the "fiscal hawks" who are currently inside the House majority.
Thompson, she added, has indicated that he wants Chenault's job.
"There's no secret that in the majority there are liberals, moderates and conservatives — it will be interesting to see who ascends to different positions of power," Downing said in a phone interview. She added that when she wrote the memo, "the fiscal hawks were on the outside looking in."
There are now discussions within the House about a small group of solidly Republican legislators who could veto a budget deal the same way as the 13-member Democratic minority, said Ashley Reed, a prominent Juneau lobbyist.
Both groups could have the numbers to block spending from an $8 billion state savings account called the Constitutional Budget Reserve, which can be used to cover the budget deficit only with a three-fourths majority vote of both the House and Senate.
"If they can get 10 majority members together, they have the ability to stop things or say no," said Reed, whose clients include utilities, health care companies, and a coalition that supports using the Permanent Fund to help pay for government spending.
Thompson, in an interview, denied that he was positioning himself to succeed Chenault. And he also denied that he's pushing the House in a more moderate direction, saying that a coalition majority with more Democrats would likely assign him an office in the Legislature's basement, or a closet.
"I definitely have Republican principles that I'll never compromise," Thompson said. Though he added: "It would be nice if we could get along better."
Chenault, for his part, said he never talks about the organization of the next majority caucus until after the legislative session is over.
"What I've found is people who talk about organization this early in an election year may not be back to worry about organization," he said. "You need to worry about getting the job done that people sent us down here for. Then you need to worry about getting elected — and then you can worry about organization."