Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, the leading candidate for governor, just barely crested the important 50% mark in the latest election results the Alaska Division of Elections released Thursday.
His nearest challenger, Republican business owner Bernadette Wilson, has 28.7%.
Kreiss-Tomkins declared victory in a news release Friday morning after CNN projected he would win. His campaign said the remaining 35,000 ballots are from districts he’s favored to win by a comfortable margin.
“Alaskans voted for change and for a government that works across party lines to move Alaska forward. Our administration will not waste a single day getting to work to solve problems for Alaska,” Kreiss-Tomkins said in the statement.
The Associated Press has not called a winner in the race.
The results Thursday added 5,723 early, absentee and questioned ballots to the total, primarily from Southeast. Ballots sent from overseas have until Nov. 18, which is also when the last ballots will be counted.
If Kreiss-Tomkins still has more than half the vote by then, he’ll win the four-way race, without a tabulation of ranked choices. It would also weaken an argument — in circulation since Democrat Tom Begich dropped out in August — that a Kreiss-Tomkins victory was only possible because the other three candidates on the ballot are Republicans, splitting the conservative vote.
In the U.S. Senate race, Democrat Mary Peltola pulled further ahead of Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan on Thursday. She now has 49% of the vote, compared to 46.8% for Sen. Sullivan. Even if she does not reach the 50% mark, she’s currently past another important threshold: Her lead of 5,800 votes is greater than the number of votes for Daniel J. Sullivan Jr.
The Trump administration in October sued to preemptively block “any election result that may be impacted by voter confusion.” It said that threshold would be met if Sen. Sullivan lost to Peltola by less than the votes that went to the other Sullivan. A District Court judge dismissed the case but the Trump administration is appealing. If Peltola’s lead over the senator remains above the other Sullivan’s vote total, it would seem to render the appeal moot.
Republican Congressman Nick Begich continues to lead in the U.S. House race. and Ballot Measure 2, which would repeal Alaska’s voting system, slipped further behind in the latest results. “No” leads with 53% of the vote.
Source: alaskapublic.org
