U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski has taken a narrow lead of 1,658 votes over her conservative Republican challenger Kelly Tshibaka. As of Nov. 18, Murkowski has 112,519 votes (43.32%) to Tshibaka’s 110,861 votes (42.68%).
On election night Tshibaka held a 44.36% to 42.69% lead over Murkowski, but that advantage has evaporated as absentee, early and overseas ballots have come into the state’s division of elections.
Since neither candidate will garner more than 50% of the vote, it will heads to a ranked-choice runoff on Nov. 23, which will only take seconds as the numbers are plugged into a computer.
The first candidate to be eliminated will be conservative Republican Buzz Kelley, who finished in fourth place with less than 3% of the vote. Many of Buzz Kelley’s second-choice votes are expected to go to Tshibaka, but they still won’t be enough to push her over 50%.
The next person to be eliminated will be hard-left Democrat Patricia Chesbro, who now has 10.3% of the overall vote. The majority of her second-place votes will likely go to Murkowski, who sides with Democrats on issues like abortion and the LGBTQ agenda. That said, many Democrats despise Murkowski because she voted to confirm former President Trump’s Supreme Court nominees who ultimately overturned Roe v. Wade this year. Tshibaka is hoping many Chesbro voters have simply refused to select a second choice. If so, this might give Tshibaka a narrow victory.
In the race for U.S. House, Mary Peltola now has 48.68% of the vote, compared to Sarah Palin’s 25.79% and Nick Begich’s 23.38%. This race will also likely go to a ranked choice runoff on Nov. 23.
45 Comments
And this my friends is how cheating and RCV screws you and everyone that voted against Lisa Murkowski. She knew thus was going to happen and sold it to enough people to get it in to our voting system. This is so sad. If you can’t win on your own merit you do t belong in office. Take a breather. This my fellow Alaskans and Americans is why we need term limits. There are plenty of loosers to step up into a position after you leave. With term limits it will stop some of the corruption in D.C. and Juneau. There are people that can carry the torch. You had your shot Lisa, it’s time to step down. Your ineffective anymore.
Uh, Murkowski and Peltola both have the most votes in the initial round, and will again after the RCV redistributions. So how is it that you’re getting screwed by RCV, exactly? It’s Palin that screwed you by splitting the GOP vote.
RCV is wrong on principle. If you cast a ballot it should be counted, but if it goes to ranked choice and you don’t rank those still in contention, your ballot isn’t numbered with the final count. In other words, the winner of the RCV will have a majority of only the ballots counted in that round not of all ballots cast. Imagine having to declare who you will vote for before you are allowed into the polling place. If you name the correct candidate, you may enter to cast your ballot. If not, you are turned away and are not counted. At least if we had a runoff election one may choose to stay home and not be counted, then the winner would have a majority of the ballots cast but this is not possible with ranked choice.
Man, do you have that backward! Begich, split the ticket, with total disregard for helping Republicans stay in office, in a Republican state. And then GOP Rino’s ( McConnel) funneled millions of dollars into Murkowski’s campaign. Alaska, voters are being victimized at two fronts. You might want to read the commentary of Joel Davidson, (above) and you’ll understand. Joel, it was spot on!
This is a really strange take. Murkowski has a plurality of votes if we stopped counting now, and a majority if you factor in RCV.
It is time for the Republican Party to once again field serious candidates. I was relieved in the last campaign cycle to see serious politicians from both parties winning against performative clowns like Palin and Tshibaka.
Truth Network! Now there is a contradiction of terms.
As an incumbent, Lisa, had tons of money, democrat votes, and McConnell’s backing. The fact that a neophyte gave her such a credible fight speaks volumes.
Praise Christ! Our great state was almost stuck with those RepubliCANTS.
Do not invoke the name of the Lord.
Should have added, ” in vain”.
Now we are stuck with tax and spend dummycrats
Hi Rich, I wonder how you square this comment with the fact that the size of government decreased under Clinton, increased dramatically under Bush, decreased under Obama, and increased under Trump?
These numbers are from the conservative Brookings institution.
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2020/10/07/the-true-size-of-government-is-nearing-a-record-high/
It has been a long, long time since the Republicans were fiscally responsible. If you increase spending without increasing taxes, you are taxing our children, our grand-children, and the unborn. It is shameful.
The GOP should be re-examining its policies, and focusing on true conservative values: Fiscal conservatism, and individual liberty.
We need to get closed primaries back. Murkowski would have been ousted in the primary, with Democrats unable to vote for her. The battle between Palin and Begich would’ve been settled, with only 1 Republican advancing to face Peltola in the general. Open primaries have caused chaos for Alaska’s elections.
Thats kinda the point of the ranked choice system. People don’t want to be stuck voting for a terrible candidate because their party says they dont have a choice. If all of Palins and begichs voters wanted a republican no matter what, they would all have second ranked each other and NOT ranked the others. You guys chose selfish pride over what you claim is the best path for the state. Palin should have dropped out and endorsed Begich after the last election.
The actual point is; People don’t want a system that “requires” that they place an “X” by the name of a candidate for whom they would “not” vote for to begin with, in order for their vote to be properly processed. Under proper legal assessment, that is tampering with the voting process.. Typically, people on a public board place a “SARC” notation after making sarcastic commentary, and I see some forget to do that occasionally.
Lobo, you arent required to mark anyones name if you don’t want to. But we get to CHOOSE.
Your view that ranking someone means you support them is misguided. Theres going to be 3 or 4 names on the ballot. You choose how you want to rank them. Bottom line is you are going to be stuck with one of those people in charge. You only hurt yourself by not ranking them favorite to least favorite. Just ask the 15,000 people who voted for Begich then peltola over Palin. If palin was the only R on the ballot, those people likely would have voted for Peltola anyways. Ranked choice didn’t change her chances of winning.
If you “rank” them, you ARE “supporting” them.. By placing an “X” by their name, you have actually given them a vote.. And, yes, if you want your ballot to be processed, you are required to place that “X” by all of the candidates names in a “ranked” series… This has already been explained.
Lobo, No you don’t. You do not have to rank them all. You can rank as many or as few as you want. There is even space to do a write-in vote. If you only vote for one person, your vote will stay with them until they are eliminated; then it is gone. You could still have a say in who wins, but you’ve squandered it if you left them blank. If someone told you you would be forced to rank everyone, they LIED to you.
People already tried to challenge it in court. They all lost. There is nothing illegal, or even new, about ranked choice. Its what the people of Alaska chose with their votes.
Hi Lobo, After looking at the performative clowns put up by the GOP, my mother (a Republican for 50 years until she left the party 2 years ago) was pleased to be able to vote for Begich first, and Peltola second. Likewise she was able to vote for Murkowski first, and Chesbro second.
In each case she did not cast a vote for the performative clowns (Tshibaka and Palin) at all. She was relieved to finally have her choice count.
RCV is wrong on principle. If you cast a ballot it should be counted, but if it goes to ranked choice and you don’t rank those still in contention, your ballot isn’t numbered with the final count. In other words, the winner of the RCV will have a majority of only the ballots counted in that round not of all ballots cast. Imagine having to declare who you will vote for before you are allowed into the polling place. If you name the correct candidate, you may enter to cast your ballot. If not, you are turned away and are not counted. At least if we had a runoff election one may choose to stay home and not be counted, then the winner would have a majority of the ballots cast but this is not possible with ranked choice.
Why would anyone want to check a box for second best, (second choice) you either vote for who you want or you don’t vote. One candidate, one vote. Moving my vote around to meet the rank choice voting is just wrong. I voted for just one person, to keep from settling for second best, and to keep my vote from being corrupted by the RCV,
Two smiling baby killers. How cute.
Evil smiling gives me the creeps.
It has taken almost two weeks to fabricate enough votes to push Murk ahead of Kelley, and to Fabricate enough votes for Mary to claim 50% voted for her.
Agree. Astoundingly corrupt. Everyone needs to get on board with ridding us of RCV, cleaning up our voter rolls, and stop any mail in voting unless requested by the voter.
Dana, you are making a serious accusation. Do you have any evidence, or you just going on how you feel? Who do you even think is doing it? If Democrats could cheat…wouldn’t the Democrat be winning? Are you saying Democrats are cheating to let their second choice win?
How exactly do you think republicans are fabricating votes? Mail in and absentee votes get compared to voter registration signatures. I mean do you think they hacked into the voter rolls and stole signatures….then magically found out who hadnt voted yet so they could steal JUST those signatures?
Can you articulate how its being done?
Clark do you honestly think the Democrats don’t want Lisa to win, or are you one of those that believe the American voter actually chose Biden over Trump? Anyone with common sense knows Biden wasn’t fit for office before he ran for President, I don’t believe he has convinced anyone otherwise since. So exactly how did Biden get more votes than Donald Trump, his charm? The courts wouldn’t hear any of the evidence, no one had any standing. If you honestly believe that Dominion machines weren’t hacked and drop boxes weren’t stuff illegally, then I guess you should be left alone.
This RCV is a scam, otherwise why would Lisa’s team have backed and supported it?
Steve, regarding this that Clark says, “If you are so sure the votes are fake and your voice is being stolen, why are you still voting? ” This is EXACTLY what the left wants us to do: say the voting system is worthless, so why should we vote? Would not that be perfect for the left if none of the humanity-loving people voted? That is their dream, but we keep screwing it up by voting in larger and larger numbers at the polls. Makes it harder to cheat when people vote on election day because the cheaters cannot plan the amount of votes to insert before hand.
Agreed with Clark. This is an incredible allegation, and I have seen zero evidence of votes being fabricated. @Joel, I recommend you consider seriously how you want your publication to be represented. You are performing a serious service, but are being let down by the comments section.
Tr… Network, yes, Joel should seriously consider how the comments section is destructive. When the lefty trolls, paid schills, bots come in on the conversations and continually insert the lefty lies in to the conversation and they (you) are unrelenting in telling the lies over and over and over it might cause uninformed people to question what is going on. However, many of the posters on this board are familiar with the political events and can pick out the lefty troll, paid schill, bot comments because these lefties spew the same thing over and over and over with no evidence to back up their rhetoric. Some day the actual truth is going to remove the lefty paid schills, trolls, and bots from the internet zones – that will be a beautiful day!
Steve…its now TWO years after the fact. Trump himself started over 60 court cases…he had standing. His lawyers, Rudy, the mypillow guy, and even an entire group of loyal DOJ people including the attorney general investigated every single allegation of fraud. They found NO significant fraud. What was found was mostly Republicans voting for their dead relatives in order to gin up fake reports of Dem fraud.
Every single one of these swing states has done recount after recount. Arizona hired Trump supporters ‘Cyber Ninjas’ to do a recount which took them 6 months…Biden actually GAINED a few votes from them, lol.
Seriously, I would love to hear a plausible theory about how votes were stolen all across the country and nobody can find evidence of it except conservatives that wont share the evidence with anyone else! Lol.
I would suggest that if you don’t trust our voting system, then you are welcome to not participate in it. If you are so sure the votes are fake and your voice is being stolen, why are you still voting? Republicans undermining election integrity with false claims of fraud is a GIFT to Democrats. Endless false claims of cheating encourages more conservatives to cheat, and it disillusions conservative voters that you con into believing it. Plus it gives cover to the few people who actually do stupid shenanigans. Remember The Boy Who Cried Wolf?….Now its The Giant Orange Baby that Cried Fraud! I couldn’t engineer a more ingenious plan than to convince republicans to get their own voters to stop voting! And to make them think it was helping them and that it was their own idea! That is some next level psy op stuff!
Spot on Dana!!
Murkowski set up the ranked choice voting so that she and her buddies could win. Looks like their cheating is working!
https://www.projectveritasaction.com/news/breaking-staffers-claim-sen-lisa-murkowski-secretly-supported-ranked-voting/
https://mustreadalaska.com/project-veritas-ii-murkowski-confronted-by-investigative-journalist-says-ballot-measure-2-was-led-by-the-people/
https://alaskawatchman.com/2022/08/10/video-exposes-murkowski-camps-support-of-deceptive-ranked-choice-vote-scheme/
November 23? Who knows about this runoff the day before Thanksgiving? This, in itself, sounds fishy!
There is no run-off election. There is just the ranked choice process, which happens on the 23rd which is the deadline to have legal ballots counted(ie. post marked by election day).
The votes are already input into computers by that time and it tabulates the winner automatically. There are several layers of rules and security systems in place to ensure its kept safe and fair.
“Safe and fair” are incompatible with dominion voting systems. Nobody is buying your communist lies anymore. You are either with the patriots of this nation or against us. Sounds like you have chosen treason.
Nunya, there is no evidence of any problems with Dominion vote tabulators. Arizona had a few machines that went on the fritz. It didn’t stop people from voting.
Last year they HAND COUNTED all 340,000 votes and the vote compared to what the dominion machine counted was 171 votes! The difference between the results was less than one hundredth of 1 percent….so it was 99.99% accurate.
On top of that, the state keeps all the ballots and they have conducted random recounts of precincts since 1998 and not a single recount has ever got to a 1% error rate. The voting machines are kept in a locked, monitored, alarmed site year round that goes off if anything the size of a mouse gets in. They have literally responded to alarms cuz of mice. They don’t have network access or wi-fi, so they can’t be hacked. The only time they have internet access is a wired modem that plugs in externally to transmit the results then is unplugged. The results are compared MULTIPLE times by multiple different election officials so they catch virtually every error.
Just how exactly do you think the counts could be more secure and accurate?
Clark, good job keeping the left’s narrative going and rewriting history to make it fit their story.
FOH…it’s not a narrative…its just reality.
Seriously…i entertain the notion that when fraud is alleged, it should be investigated. Every candidate should have the right to scrutinize things to make sure its fair. But you arent really entertaining ANY possibility other than ‘if we won its fair, if we lose its rigged’. won and the other side cheated.
You can feel that way…but feelings arent facts. You need EVIDENCE to take it to court.
Clark, the evidence for fraud is out there. Mike Lindell, Gregg and Katherine, Dinesh D’Souza’s 2000 Mules (and more mules actually), and the recent AZ elections for example. If you don’t want to acknowledge the evidence, your refusal to acknowledge the evidence does not change the fact that the evidence is indisputable. Like I said, good job keeping the lefties narrative going Clark. It is said in the Saul Alinsky 12 rules that the more you (Clark, for example) keep repeating the lie(s) the more truth they become – Not what a God-fearing People would call a truth however!
Californian
Clark is related to Mike paccaro! I hope paccaro is enjoying his money haul from murky for promoting rcv!!
Dave, I doubt it since I don’t know who that is.
“Which only takes seconds as numbers are plugged into a computer”?!?!?! I think there needs to be equal amount of Murkowski’s people and Tshibaka’s people finalizing the numbers……not a computer. We need TRANSPARENCY.
fish,fish,fish,fish we love fish.