Nick Begich nears U.S. House election victory as more Alaska ballots are counted

An employee of the Alaska Division of Elections sorts election material on Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024, at division headquarters in Juneau. (Photo by James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)

Republican U.S. House candidate Nick Begich has almost clinched an electoral victory over Democratic incumbent Rep. Mary Peltola.

On Tuesday night, the Alaska Division of Elections added more than 38,000 votes to the state's electoral count, and those new additions failed to significantly close the gap between Peltola and Begich.

Before the new count, Begich led Peltola by 10,133 votes; he now leads by 9,550 .

A preliminary estimate based on figures published by the Division of Elections to date indicates Tuesday night's count included about four-sevenths of the known remaining uncounted ballots.

Carol Beecher, director of the Division of Elections, said only that the new ballots represent a mixture of absentee, early and questioned ballots and that she did not have "a hard number" for the amount of uncounted votes.

Begich has 49.1% of the overall vote, less than the threshold needed to avoid a ranked choice tabulation on Nov. 20.

As long as Begich holds less than 50% of the vote, voters who picked Alaskan Independence Party candidate John Wayne Howe or Democratic candidate Eric Hafner will have their votes redistributed to Peltola, Begich or no one at all.

In order to pass Begich, Peltola would need more than 80% of those second-choice votes.

The new ballots also showed another statewide race nearing conclusion.

On Ballot Measure 2, which seeks to repeal the state's system of open primary elections and ranked choice general election, "yes" for repeal leads "no" by 2,841 votes, or exactly 1% of all votes cast. That's down from a 4,137-vote lead on Friday.

Ballot Measure 1, which would increase the state's minimum wage, mandate sick leave, and prohibit employers from holding mandatory political and religious meetings, continues to pass by a wide margin. All judges on the ballot are on course to be retained, and no state legislative seats changed leaders.

Tuesday's results included 38,158 new votes. It wasn't immediately clear whether those ballots came from absentee voters, early voters, or voters whose ballots were "questioned" and needed additional ID verification before counting.

Before Tuesday's count, there were an estimated 71,140 uncounted early, absentee and questioned ballots, using figures published in the morning by the Division of Elections, then subtracting early and absentee ballots known to have been included in the Election Day count.

Subtracting the new votes from that estimate leaves 32,982 remaining ballots. Newly arrived absentee ballots could inflate that total further.

State law allows for absentee ballots to be counted if they are postmarked on or before Election Day and reach elections officials by Nov. 15 (if mailed from within the United States) or Nov. 20 (if mailed internationally).

Additional ballot counts are scheduled for Friday and next Tuesday, based on a timeline published by the division before Election Day.

The new results were patchy, with some state House districts' results unchanged. In Homer's House District 6, for example, no new ballots were added to the count.

In Fairbanks' Senate District P, more than 2,000 ballots were added, and incumbent Sen. Scott Kawasaki, D-Fairbanks, grew his lead over his Republican challenger, Leslie Hajdukovich.

More than 500 new votes were tallied in Anchorage's House District 18, where Democratic incumbent Rep. Cliff Groh now holds a 19-vote lead over Republican challenger David Nelson, out of 3,244 ballots cast.

In House District 22, Democratic challenger Ted Eischeid widened his lead over Republican incumbent Rep. Stanley Wright in another closely watched race.

Only 402 of the state's 403 Election Day polling places have reported results so far. The North Slope village of Atqasuk has yet to have its votes counted.