Updated: The Associated Press declared Dan Sullivan the winner of the U.S. Senate race in Alaska late Tuesday night, saying "it became evident Tuesday when the state began counting about 20,000 absentee and questioned ballots that Begich could not overcome his opponent."
Incumbent Mark Begich had not conceded Wednesday morning. "Sen. Begich believes every vote deserves to be counted in this election," campaign manager Susanne Fleek-Green said in an email to The Associated Press. "There are tens of thousands of outstanding votes and Sen. Begich has heard from rural Alaskans that their votes deserve to be counted and their voices deserve to be heard. He will honor those requests."
ANCHORAGE — The gap in Alaska’s undecided U.S. Senate race narrowed with the counting of early ballots and some absentee and questioned ballots Tuesday, while a lead in the election for governor widened.
So far, the totals in both contests still show the incumbents trailing.
The Division of Elections tallied more than 17,000 ballots from West Fairbanks, the Kenai Peninsula, Ketchikan and parts of Anchorage and the Matanuska-Susitna Borough on Tuesday. That included more than 2,000 early ballots, as well as nearly 11,000 absentee and more than 4,000 questioned ballots. There are at least 30,000 uncounted ballots remaining, with counting to resume Friday and some absentee ballots still trickling in through the mail, including some from overseas.
The counting could go until Nov. 19.
Incumbent Democratic Sen. Mark Begich closed on Republican challenger Dan Sullivan, who is now up by 7,911, about 3.2 percent. That’s 239 votes fewer than Sullivan’s lead on Begich after voting on Election Day a week ago.
In the gubernatorial election, independent challenger Bill Walker’s lead over incumbent Republican Gov. Sean Parnell grew by 839 votes to 4,004, or 1.6 percent.
Parnell’s campaign manager, Tom Wright, was one of the dozens of observers aligned with various campaigns and state political parties watching the counting at the Division of Elections regional office in Anchorage.
“It really is a mundane process, to be honest,” Wright said while taking a break.
Election workers in five regional offices across Alaska reviewed ballots for identification, registration and address information. Then, in batches, the ballots are brought to others who slide them into machines that print out a record of results on what looks like receipt paper.
Amid the sounds of rustling papers in the Anchorage office Tuesday, observers and reporters watched the vote counting. An election worker’s service dog sat in the corner. News photographers snapped photos and shot video from behind a chain partitioning the room while the four women behind vote-counting machines ran ballots through.
“They just put up with it,” Elections Director Gail Fenumiai said of her employees.
“It’s busy,” she said. “Not much downtime. But that’s good. It means we’re doing our job and things are moving along as normal.
Fenumiai said a few thousand ballots had been rejected during the review process. And while observers can challenge a ballot, Wright said he had seen very few successful challenges from anyone.
Wright and other Parnell campaigners observing the vote counting Tuesday said they were cautious but optimistic about the governor’s chances of keeping his job.
“We’re always optimistic,” Wright said. “It’d be better to be 3,000 votes up than 3,000 votes down, that’s for sure. We still have a chance. It’s a pretty high threshold that we have to pull, but it’s doable.”
The Walker campaign said in a statement it planned to announce the leaders of a transition team Wednesday.
Begich campaign spokesman Max Croes said the wait for a winner in the Senate contest would continue.
“Tens of thousands of votes remain uncounted, and those Alaskans deserve for their voices to be heard,” Croes said, echoing statements his campaign has made in the past week. “The Division of Elections has not yet begun to count outstanding ballots for significant portions of the state.”
The whole process can take up to three weeks after the election, between reviewing, counting and the State Review Board’s work in Juneau, Fenumiai said.
For the division workers, the busiest time of an election is right after Election Day, she said.
“It doesn’t just end,” Fenumiai said.
The target for the election’s certification is Nov. 28.
Staff writer Casey Grove is the News-Miner’s Anchorage reporter. Contact him at 770-0722 or follow on Twitter: @kcgrove.
