Alaska Ballot Counting Leaves Senate Race Uncertain for Weeks

Ballot rubber meets the grind of campaign road as Alaska prepares to count 30,000 absentee and early-cast ballots nearly a week after one of the most bizarre and hotly contested U.S. Senate races ever.  This is the first wave out of a total of 125,000 ballots requiring assessment by the state Division of Elections.

Copious examination of the ballots, which will begin on Wednesday, is hoped to clarify who possesses the lead in this race based on a heavier-than-expected number of write-in ballots cast for incumbent Senator Lisa Murkowski (I).  Murkowski forged ahead with an ambitious and stubborn write-in campaign for the general election after an embarrassing defeat to Joe Miller (R), a once unknown local pol and magistrate judge who was suddenly catapulted to political notoriety by an endorsement from former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

By the end of election night, Murkowski was in the lead in what had become a three-way race, capturing 41% of the vote to Miller’s 35% and Democratic-nominee Mayor Scott McAdams 24%.  The virtually unknown McAdams, overshadowed by the intense publicity showered upon Miller and Murkowski, has already conceded the race. Reports Jill Burke in the Alaska Morning Dispatch:

The Alaska Division of Elections is gearing up Tuesday for a lot of counting. It has about 125,000 ballots to inspect, assess and either count or toss aside — a number representing more than half of the votes cast a week ago, with the bulk of the yet-to-be determined ballots coming from voters who opted for a write-in candidate over a party nominee.

The outcome will determine whether incumbent U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who ran as a write-in candidate, successfully fended off opponent Joe Miller, as early returns seemed to indicate. Write-in ballots, most of which are expected to go to Murkowski, surpass Miller’s votes by 13,439.

Joe Miller, appearing on a recent segment of FOX & Friends, is waiting it out despite the six-point advantage, saying that he was “cautiously optimistic” of the outcome.  Reports Phil Vogel of FOX News:

Miller pointed out that in the past the reviewing of ballots has made a significant difference, “the last write-in campaign was Robin Taylor’s bid for governor in 1998, and approximately 7.8 percent of those ballets were disqualified.  We assume that the same standard will be applied by the division of elections in this election.”

The only U.S. Senator to win by write-in was the late Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-SC) in 1954.

Charles D. Ellison, Managing Editor for Politic365.com, Washington Correspondent for The Philadelphia Tribune and a weekly political analyst providing insight on WDAS-FM (Philadelphia), WVON-AM (Chicago) and KSRO-AM (Sonoma County, CA). He is author of the critically-acclaimed urban political thriller TANTRUM. More information can be found at http://www.cdellison.com

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