Peltola Campaign Claims Victory in Alaska Senate Race as Lead Nears 4,000 Votes

Democrat Mary Peltola’s campaign has declared that she will win Alaska’s U.S. Senate race, pointing to a lead of nearly 4,000 first-choice votes over Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan. The Associated Press has not called the contest, and the outcome remains unofficial.

Peltola, a former U.S. representative, held 121,487 first-choice votes (48.73 per cent) to Sullivan’s 117,512 (47.13 per cent) in the latest official tally from the Alaska Division of Elections, a lead of 3,975 votes with 249,325 ballots counted. Her campaign manager, Cheryl Bruce, said the latest ballot release showed there was “not a viable path to reelection for Senator Sullivan.”

That is the campaign’s assessment, not a conclusion independently reached by the AP. Alaska is the last Senate race in the country still uncalled after the November 3 midterms, and its result will decide whether Democrats finish with 55 or 56 seats.

The count so far

The lead has grown sharply since the early days of the count. When NationWire last reported on the race on November 9, Peltola led by just 637 votes, with about 75,000 ballots still to be tallied. The count released on Tuesday added almost 25,000 ballots and widened her advantage, and later batches from the Mat-Su region narrowed it slightly to the current margin.

About 86 per cent of the expected vote has now been counted, according to AP estimates. Republican Gerald Heikes holds 5,426 first-choice votes (2.18 per cent), while Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. — a retired teacher from Petersburg who shares the incumbent senator’s name — has 4,100 (1.64 per cent). A further 800 votes went to write-in candidates.

Counting is not finished. The Division of Elections is expected to release another update on Friday, November 13. Ballots mailed from inside the United States must arrive by that day, while ballots sent from overseas can arrive as late as November 18.

A courtroom setback for the campaign

Peltola’s campaign suffered a legal defeat on Wednesday, when Superior Court Judge Thomas Matthews denied its request for a list of voters whose absentee ballots had been rejected.

The campaign committee, Alaskans for Mary, sued Lieutenant Governor Nancy Dahlstrom and Elections Director Carol Beecher last week, seeking the names of voters whose absentee ballots were rejected, along with the codes showing whether each ballot was accepted or rejected and why. The campaign said it wanted the information to make sure eligible votes were counted.

Judge Matthews called the request “not reasonable” at the height of the count, writing that the Division of Elections is “currently busy processing ballots” and “simply lacks the capacity to generate the report” from its voter registration database. He also held that the daily reports shown to ballot observers are temporary working documents, not public records, and cannot reasonably be produced and stripped of confidential details such as voters’ home addresses now. The Sullivan campaign intervened in the case. The ruling was reported by multiple outlets on Thursday.

Why the race is still not over

Neither candidate has passed 50 per cent of first-choice votes, so under Alaska’s ranked-choice system the seat will almost certainly be decided by a tabulation scheduled for November 18 — unless one of them crosses the majority threshold as the remaining ballots are counted.

In that tabulation, the lowest-performing candidates are eliminated and their ballots redistributed according to each voter’s next valid preference. Heikes and Sullivan Jr. hold a combined 9,526 first-choice votes between them, more than double Peltola’s current lead, so their voters’ second choices could still matter.

Early ranked-choice modelling based on partial data still points to Peltola, though thousands of rural ballots counted by hand are not yet included in those figures. The Division of Elections is due to declare its unofficial winners on November 18, with final certification targeted for November 25.

What is at stake

With Alaska’s result still pending, Democrats hold a 55-44 edge in the Senate tally. A Peltola victory would lift them to 56 seats, while a Sullivan win would leave the margin at 55-45.

The race has been the most litigated contest of the 2026 midterms, with disputes over ballot handling running alongside the slow count. For now, both campaigns are watching the same numbers: a lead of just under 4,000 votes, a further update due on Friday, and a ranked-choice tabulation next week that will decide the last uncalled Senate seat in the country.

FAQ

Has the Associated Press called the Alaska Senate race?

No. The AP has not called the race. Peltola’s campaign has declared that she will win, but that is the campaign’s assessment, not an official call. The result remains unofficial until certification.

When will the Alaska Senate race be decided?

If no candidate tops 50 per cent of first-choice votes, the state will run a ranked-choice tabulation on November 18. The Division of Elections is due to declare unofficial winners that day, with final certification targeted for November 25.

Why did a judge rule against the Peltola campaign?

Superior Court Judge Thomas Matthews denied the campaign’s request for a list of voters whose absentee ballots were rejected, ruling that election officials are too busy counting ballots to produce the report and that the daily observer reports sought are temporary working documents, not public records.