Finally it’s done. Here in the Great Country, the 2024 election results are final, the final list of ranked-choice voting has been completed and all results are available. The news, as is often the case, is mixed.
First, Republican Nick Begich III is officially the winner of Alaska’s at-large House seat. (Overwhelmingly) red Alaska will once again be represented by a Republican, and Mary Peltola can return to Bethel, where we wish her a long, joyful and fit life with her loved ones – and away from politics. Incumbent Democrat Mary Peltola conceded on Wednesday.
After more than a year of calling Nick Begich III a scammer of seniors, a slave owner of workers and a man who would single-handedly lead to no fish, children and jobs in Alaska, Rep. Mary Peltola cleared the air in Congress the evening of Nov. 20 after ranked-choice voting took place at the Juneau office of the state elections department.
Begich’s victory was predicted by Decision Desk HQ on November 16th.
See related: Republican Nick Begich III wins the Alaska House At-Large seat
None of this year’s elections returned early count results, according to an analysis by Suzanne Downing of the website Must Read Alaska overturned by the RCV system – which still doesn’t make the idea any less bad.
Not many seats went through the ranked-choice voting machine in Alaska’s 2024 general election Wednesday night. Only nine were controversial enough to reach the tabulation stage.
The presidency was already decided as more than 54% of voters chose Donald Trump.
When it comes to the congressional seat, Nick Begich had a lead in the rankings and he maintained that lead. Under the regular electoral system he would have won anyway.
Then we come to the Senate and House races for the Alaska Legislature. There were nine that had more than two candidates, and according to the rankings, the leaders were still ahead. Not a single one of them moved to second place.
I won’t bother you with the results of our House and District elections, except to say that I am not disappointed with any of these results. Our part of the valley leans fairly heavily Republican, and local election results generally reflect that.
Now for the bad news: Ballot Measure 2, repealing ranked-choice voting (RCV) failed by a hair’s breadth.
While the repeal measure, Ballot Measure 2, led the vote count from Election Day through Monday, it was in the lead evaporates as more early and mail-in ballots were counted. The department had a deadline to complete its count by Wednesday. That was the last day under state law that the department could accept postmarked ballots mailed from abroad.
The final count of the unofficial results showed 159,955 yes votes and 160,619 no votes, a margin of 664 votes.
Repeal organizer Phil Izon sent an email to supporters Wednesday pledging to bring the issue back to voters in 2026.
We have already signed up 400 volunteers
I need 100 sponsors to submit the modern RCV repeal. I changed the language to title the bill “Remove Ranked Choice Voting,” most likely “24RRCV will be the title.”
Please reply to this email if you would like to be one of Repeal RCV’s sponsors.I will complete another petition later this year, I also need 100 sponsors for this petition.
See related: Alaska Election Preview: Will the Last Frontier Make Ranked Voting Obsolete?
This is a narrow loss for repeal, and the opposition was fueled by a lot of “outside” money. There is a possibility that we can repeal this bad idea in 2026, given the lower turnout of more motivated voters that is typical of midterm elections. Mr. Izon shows no signs of giving up.
Here in Alaska, our long, painful vote count is finally over for now. Now we can pause, take a deep breath of the subarctic air and start planning for 2026, because this is a competition that never ends.
