Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the moderate Alaska Republican who has routinely broken with her party to criticize President Donald Trump, has made a startling admission about the reality of serving in public office at a time when an unbound leader in the Oval Office is bent on retribution against his political foes.

“We are all afraid,” Murkowski said, speaking at a conference in Anchorage on Monday. After pausing for about five seconds, she acknowledged: “It’s quite a statement. But we are in a time and a place where I certainly have not been here before. I’ll tell you, I’m oftentimes very anxious myself about using my voice, because retaliation is real. And that’s not right.”

Murkowski’s comments were first reported by the Anchorage Daily News.

Murkowski Is a Republican Willing to Criticize Trump

Murkowski, an independent voice in an increasingly tribal party, has been the rare Republican on Capitol Hill willing to criticize the Trump administration. After Trump in February berated President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine in the Oval Office, she warned that the United States was “walking away from our allies.”

She has routinely criticized the Department of Government Efficiency for creating a “tremendous amount of unnecessary anxiety” and for firing federal workers in her state. And Murkowski was one of only three Republicans who voted not to confirm Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Murkowski has become more outspoken in Trump’s second term, but she has long been part of a small minority in her party willing to stand up to its leader at a time when most GOP lawmakers have chosen to fall in line. She was one of seven Republicans who voted in 2021 to convict Trump in his second impeachment trial, and the only one up for reelection at the time. She was also one of three Republicans who voted to support Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s confirmation to the Supreme Court.

Murkowski has been upfront about her discomfort in a party led by Trump, whom she said she refused to vote for last year; Murkowski endorsed former Gov. Nikki Haley of South Carolina for president. At the time, Murkowski even considered leaving the party altogether, although she has not done so.

“I just regret that our party is seemingly becoming a party of Donald Trump,” she told CNN last year. When asked if she would leave it and become an independent, she said that she was “navigating my way through some very interesting political times. Let’s just leave it at that.”

On Monday in Anchorage, Murkowski said she did not plan to stop speaking out, even if she was frightened of retaliation. “That’s what you’ve asked me to do,” she said, referring to her constituents. “I’m going to use my voice to the best of my ability.”

She added: “I have to figure out how I can do my best to help the many who are so anxious and are so afraid.”

Murkowski, a fourth-term senator, is up for reelection in 2028.

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Annie Karni/Haiyun Jiang
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