Responding to Anon on Ranked Choice Voting

Anonymous commented oaa  previous post about Ranked Choice Voting (RCV).  They raised common issues  about RCV.  I decided it was easier, if I responded in a new post.  This is it.

To make it as clear as possible for the reader to distinguish between us, my comments are in BLUE and the commenter's comments are RED  

"These are things to consider when you are waxing poetic about RCV:"  

From US Dictionary:   

"The idiom "waxing poetic" describes the action of speaking or writing in an increasingly enthusiastic or eloquent manner. Often, this phrase is used when someone starts using a more florid or poetic language than might be expected or necessary."

This was a pretty fact based blog post.  Not particularly enthusiastic for ranked choice nor particularly florid.  I did speak positively about open primaries, saying they led to bi-partisan majorities in the legislature.  The basic tone is a fairly muted support of RCV as in this quote:

"There is no perfect system.  Whatever system you have, people figure out ways to game the system.  Ideally, we will not get rid of Ranked Choice Voting in November and we can learn how to make it work."

"Ballot Exhaustion" & Disenfranchisement: In RCV, if all the candidates you ranked are eliminated in early rounds, your ballot is marked as "exhausted" and discarded before the final tally. Consequently, the winner often claims a "majority" only of the remaining active ballots, not a true majority of all voters who cast a ballot. 

You don't necessarily get a majority in any non-RCV election if it's a three or four way race, say  if there is a Republican, a Democrat, and an Independent on the ballot.  In most elections, the one with the most votes - not a necessarily a majority - wins.  The Anchorage Municipal election for mayor partially addresses this by requiring a runoff if no one gets at least 45% of the vote.  

At least in RCV you get to pick a second and third choice - meaning if your first choice candidate doesn't win, you get a chance to vote for a second choice candidate.  That doesn't happen in the old system.  In that system, if your first choice doesn't win, your vote is essentially exhausted too.  

⁠The "Center-Squeeze" & Non-Monotonicity*: RCV can produce bizarre mathematical anomalies where gaining support can cause a candidate to lose, or losing support can cause them to win. A moderate candidate who is the acceptable second choice for almost everyone can get eliminated in the first round simply because they lacked enough intense first-place votes, leaving two polarizing extremes.

First, I agree, that it's possible for someone to be everyone's second choice, but they wouldn't get onto the general election ballot because they didn't get enough first place votes.  Probably not likely, but possible.  But with closed primaries, that candidate probably wouldn't make it to the general election. If you had three candidates on the general ballot under the old system, I don't know that the hypothetical moderate would win either  and we wouldn't ever know they were everyone's second choice. 

Complexity & Higher Error Rates: Ranking multiple candidates increases the cognitive load on voters and leads to higher rates of spoiled ballots (e.g., unintentionally ranking two candidates first or skipping ranks). This complexity disproportionately impacts older voters, non-native English speakers, and lower-income communities.

I was a poll worker at two elections that were RCV.  My station was the scanner, where the voters put their ballots into the voting machine.  The machines spit out ballots that are marked incorrectly - for example, two candidates are marked as second choice.  The voter gets to have a new ballot and vote again.  The old ballot is turned in, torn up, and put into a destroyed ballot envelope.  All in front of the voter.  That didn't happen very often.  But I do suspect that some people's brains are wired so that an RCV ballot is harder for them to figure out.  But my experience is that it was a very small percent of voters. Voters made mistakes under the old system too. 

It would be an interesting study to be at a scanner and try to find common factors among people whose ballot is rejected because they marked the RCV ballot incorrectly.  It would also be tricky to do because of the confidentiality of elections and avoiding intimidating voters.  

Delayed Election Results: Because all ballots must be centralized and fully processed before any elimination round can occur, RCV slows down the reporting process. Late-arriving mail-in or military ballots can delay final results for days or weeks, which erodes public trust in election integrity.

It does take longer to tally votes if no candidate gets a majority in the first round.  But many races only have two candidates in the general election.  The problem, as I understand it, lies with the fact that for the second round, you have to wait for all the absentee ballots to arrive before tabulating the second round percentages.  But that is also a problem with regular voting that is close. 

For this you could do a study to see how many close votes are delayed until all the absentee votes are in for an RCV election and a regular election.  In Alaska you could compare the primary to the general, though we probably get more candidates in the primary than normal because of the open primaries.  Having a president who constantly tells the world that the elections are rigged, does a lot more harm to public confidence than a few dragged out elections  Most voters understand the need to wait for absentee ballots to come in.  

But why does it matter?  As long as the winner is determined before they need to be sworn in, there is no problem except that people are impatient to know who the winner is.  


Increased Costs & System Upgrades: Transitioning to RCV requires expensive updates to voting software, hardware, and extensive public education campaigns funded by taxpayers.

Upgrades - these have already been done.  Changing back to regular elections will cost more if we change back than if we keep what we have.  

Also, with RCV, you don't have the expense of runoff elections as we have in Anchorage mayoral races if no one gets at least 45%.  

*Non-Monotonicity - anyone else unable to explain that?  I did look it up.  Not sure how it applies here  Maybe because the highest vote getter can change from one round to the next when the second and third round votes get added in and the lowest vote getters drop out.  

Congressional Fisheries Debate Today - Begich and Hill; Sullivan and Peltola

Today, the Congressional Debate on Fisheries took place in Kodiak.  The Governor's debate was Wednesday.  You can watch it here.

The debate is about fish policy.  I include it here because there aren't a lot of chances to see debates between the candidates these days.  Public debates used to be common.  No longer.  

On the video below, first you hear the debate by the House candidates Rep. Begich and Bill Hill.  Then the Senate debate between Sen. Sullivan and Mary Peltola.  I'm not sure why the other two candidates in the race were not there.  Were they not invited?  Did they choose not to attend?  I don't know.  

All four candidates in the governor's race were at that debate Wednesday.  

I have a few reactions to how the candidates did, but I'll give you a chance to view the debate first.

I'd note the Bill Hill came out first and shook hands with the questioners.  Rep. Begich did the same.  Then Bill Hill went over to Rep. Begich and shook hands and spoke to him.  

We first see Sen. Sullivan and Mary Peltola sitting at the table, so I don't know whether they greeted the interviewers and each other, But the body language at the table isn't warm and fuzzy.  

Fisheries might be the least partisan big Alaskan issues.  That makes these debates less revealing, perhaps, than if we had debates that dealt with more controversial issues.  

Thoughts on Begich and Hill debate.  

I was impressed with Begich's manner and knowledge of the issues.  Hill also knew the issues. Hill's answers brought in the view of Alaska Natives and subsistence fishers.  I thought it was telling that when the questioner said a zero percent bi-catch target was unrealistic. That wasn't the question, it was an assumption underlying the question.   Hill's response was that it should be the goal.  Begich agreed.  Would Begich have said that if Hill hadn't first?  I don't know.  Mary Peltola in the second debate said no fishery has zero bi-catch but when bi-catch is in the metric tons, that's a different story.  

Begich said he had written and passed more legislation than any freshman Congressman ever.  Later he gave numbers:  13 bills, nine passed into law.  I'll see if I can find out what they were and how you research the number of bills freshman Congressmen have introduced and passed into law.  

I'd also take issue with Begich's statement that he travels the state and listens and responds to every Alaska.  I don't believe that he has spoken to an open forum in the Anchorage area the whole time he's been in office.  He speaks only to private groups that limit who attends.  These generally are not announced publicly before the event takes place.  I've written a number of letters to his office and I have not received any responses.  

Thoughts on Sullivan and Peltola debate. 

Sullivan was able to tout various bills he had passed that had improved Alaska fisheries.  He contrasted the number of bills he passed to Peltola's no bills passed, without mentioning he has been in the Senate for 12 years, almost half of that time with Trump as president.  Peltola was in Congress for only two years.  

Both candidates knew the topic.  One thing that struck me was Sullivan's tone.  Whiney isn't quite the right word, but he sounded like someone who felt like he had being unfairly attacked  and was exasperatedly trying to defend his record.  Not like a successful and confident two term Senator.  I'd note that Sullivan acknowledged that climate change was one of the factors resulting in fewer fish reaching subsistence fishers.  

But you can judge for yourself.  

Alaskan Pols Don't Seem To Believe In Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) [UPDATED]

[I started this over a week ago.  Since then, there's been a lot written about people dropping out of different races, how a couple of politicians have been blocked from running because their disclosures were incomplete.  

My basic message here is that both the Republicans and the Democrats are signaling to the public that they don't have confidence in Ranked Choice Voting (RCV).  Or in voters actually using it.  This is a shame because the Right has put a proposal on the November ballot to abolish RCV.  The Democrats, in three key races - US House and Senate, and Alaska governor's race, have discouraged (apparently more forcefully than that) Democrats from competing with each other in the general election.  To me that indicates distrust in voters being smart enough to actually use RCV to rank the Democrats on the ballot.

From what I can tell, looking at the 2024 US House race, a fair number of voters utilized their RCV option to rank candidates.  But the two extra candidates (besides the main Democrat (Mary Peltola) and the main Republican (Nick Begich) were very marginal candidates - one in prison in New York and the other in the Alaska Independence Party.  My belief is that both the candidates and the public need to learn how to use this process and it's likely the voters are smarter than the politicians think.]

We know the Republicans don't believe in it.  They opposed it strongly from the beginning and they're behind Proposition 2 which would take Alaska back to the old system.  (Prop 2, and this is important, would also get rid of open primaries - their real target - and rules about disclosure of people who contribute to PACs. You can read all 35 pages of Prop.2 here.)

When RCV was first being introduced,  the Democratic leadership opposed Ranked Choice Voting (and the open primaries attached to the initiative), but came around to support RCV.

The biggest benefit of the RCV package that Alaskans passed, would appear to be the bi-partisan majorities in the state House and Senate.  By getting rid of closed primaries, Alaskans prevented parties from electing the most extreme candidates in their party.  With open primaries (vote for one candidate), the top four candidates get to the general election ballot (Ranked Choice - you can vote your first - fourth choices).  It's resulted in more moderate legislators, who are able to work together and pass bills.  At least that seems to be the outcome.  

Our first RCV election - two key Republican candidates (Sarah Palin and Nick Begich) for US House seemed to siphon off votes from each other and Democrat Mary Peltola was elected.  The next round, the top two Republican candidates for the House worked out a deal where Nancy Dahlstrom withdrew, and Nick Begich defeated Mary Peltola.  

This current election (2026) we've seen lots of shenanigans, starting with the GOP controlled Division of Elections leaving candidate Daniel J. Sullivan off the US Senate ballot on the grounds (that exist no where in the law) that he wasn't a real candidate, that he wanted to confuse voters into thinking he was our sitting Senator, Dan S. Sullivan.  

The Alaska Supreme Court required that he be put back on the ballot.  He did reappear, but without a party affiliation (he was a registered Republican) and they added "Incumbent" to the sitting Senator's name (though the regs prohibit any honorifics).

Then voters began getting close to a million dollars worth of flyers and social media ads pushing two out-of-state candidates (yes that's legal) who were identified as progressive and an Alaska Native candidate who is listed as a Democratic Socialist and trashing leading Democratic candidate Mary Peltola.  The strategy, apparently, was to get left leaning candidates on the final ballot to draw votes from Peltola.  

They did get David Leslie (the Alaska Native candidate) on the general election ballot, but Daniel J. Sullivan also made it.  How many of his votes were 'confused with Daniel S" and how many were intentional because of all the publicity he got from the attempts to wipe him off the ballot, we probably will never know. 

So that's the Republican story.  

But the Democrats seem to not believe the voters can handle RCV either.  First, before the primary, Democratic candidate Matt Schultz withdrew from the race, taking the only serious Democratic candidate out of the election.  He says we wasn't getting the party and financial support he needed.  That left Nonpartisan Bill Hill, who got support from the normal liberal support groups - labor unions, the environmental crowd.  

Now Democrat Tom Begich (the uncle of GOP Rep Nick Begich)  has withdrawn from the general election (and the ballot) to support Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins (JKT).  JKT got 36,961 votes (22.5%) in the primary.  Begich got 34,149 votes (20.8%)  They were the two top vote getters - in the race for governor.  A bunch of Republicans split the GOP vote. The top two - Bernadette Wilson got 16,456 votes (10%) and David Bronson got 13,349 (8%).  With Begich out, that left Republican Treg Taylor to move up to the fourth spot (and the general election ballot.)  But he was disqualified for not filling in the financial disclosure info when he signed up to be a candidate.  Then his Lt. Gov candidate moved up to be the governor candidate and chose Treg Taylor's wife to be her running mate.   Though she may have the same disclosure problems her husband has. 

I'm hearing complaints from people I know, and I feel it myself, that these politicians don't trust Alaskan voters to rank the candidates.  

They don't trust the voters to rank their preferred Democrat first and the other one second.  

With two strong Democrats running for governor, it was a chance to demonstrate how RCV should work.  Each should have strongly told their supporters to vote for them first and the other Democrat second.  Emphasized that they were very similar on policy issues.  This would have been especially important this year because we also vote on whether to end RCV (and I feel compelled to always point out we would also end open primaries and disclosure of those who give dark money.  And other things are in there, like having Governor and Lt. Governor run separately, not as a team.)

Tom Begich sent a letter out to supporters that justified getting out of the race as a matter of money:

"At a time when so many Alaskans are already stretched thin, we cannot keep asking them to give more and more just to compete with much larger amounts of money flowing into politics in Alaska. Continuing through November would require millions more, and we believe that the strongest path to victory is to bring Democratic voters, donors and resources together behind one candidate.

Before we made this decision, I spoke directly with Jonathan about the priorities at the heart of our campaign and the promises we made to Alaskans.

We share a commitment to strong public schools, affordable energy, housing and health care, and making sure Alaska receives its fair share from our resources."

But it's clear both parties are wary of having more than one candidate from their party running for the same office.  The Republicans did everything they could to push the candidacies of marginal Democratic candidates onto the US Senate race.  At this point that seems to have failed.  Right now we have Peltola (the Democrat who got 49.5% of the vote in the primary) and three Republicans - the current US Senator Dan S. Sullivan, Daniel J. Sullivan, and Jerry Heikes.   [I'd note that today the Anchorage Daily News said that Democrat David Leslie has dropped out of the race under pressure from Democrats, and that Jerry Heikes, listed as a Republican, has moved up to the fourth spot.] 

And right now, there is one Democrat and three Republicans running for Governor.  (The deadline to drop out has passed, but there are questions about Jodi Taylor's financial disclosure which is pretty much the same as her husband's was.)    [UPDATE 9/9/2026:  Treg Taylor is back on the ballot on orders apparently from the Lt. Governor's (the same Nancy Dahlstrom from 2024) superiors because, they say, lots of people have left things blank and not been disqualified.]

I'd also note that Candi English (Treg Taylor's running mate) moving up as a governor candidate raises new questions.  She's been relatively invisible and it seems odd for her to leapfrog over other candidates onto the general ballot.   

There is no perfect system.  Whatever system you have, people figure out ways to game the system.  Ideally, we will not get rid of Ranked Choice Voting in November and we can learn how to make it work.

As I looked back on the 2024 US House race, there were four candidates:

• Mary Peltola
• Nick Begich
• Eric Hafner (who was then and is now a prisoner in a New York prison and labeled as a Democrat)
• John Wayne Howe (Alaska Independence Party)

This is a disparate group of candidates.  You can't judge RCV based on whether voters in this race chose to use more than one vote or not.  Why would a serious voter cast a vote for someone in prison across the country?  Possibly as protest.  But then why cast a second vote?

Peltola voters have no reason to cast a second vote.  What would be the point?  

But, in fact, people did cast second votes.  The first person eliminated was Eric Hafner.  

The charts come from the Alaska Division of Elections page here.

Hafner got 3558 votes.  The Hafner voters gave 267 to Nick Begich, 661 to John Wayne Howe, and 1313 to Mary Peltola.  That totals 2214 second place votes transferred to other candidates.  62% of the people who voted for Hafner ranked a second candidate.  That seems to be a fair number.  (I understand exhausted on the chart to mean that there wasn't a second choice vote.  Overvotes, I think means they marked more than one person for the same ranking.  [I called the Division of Elections in Anchorage to check.  They referred me to the main office in Juneau.  The guy who answered the phone had to go ask someone else.  But eventually he confirmed that my guesses were correct.  I also asked about the Fraction column and he had to go ask again.  Apparently for some jurisdictions the votes can be divided into fractions, but Alaska doesn't do that so these are whole votes, or 1.]

John Wayne Howe got 13,871 votes and 7541 of his voters (or 54%) ranked someone second.  

Given that Eric Hafner and John Wayne Howe voters were probably disaffected voters who chose a) a New York prisoner and b) and Alaska Independence Party candidate as their first choice, these seem like fairly high percentages of voters using RCV.  

If there were two strong candidates from the same party with very similar policy positions on the general ballot, I'd guess there would be a higher percentage of second place votes.  It's true that the first time around (2022), Sarah Palin and Nick Begich (both Republicans) attacked each other instead of working together.  In 2024 the second place 'name' Republican, Nancy Dahlstrom, dropped out rather than run against Nick Begich.  

But we won't see two such candidates from the Democratic side in state wide office elections this year.  We will see that with Republicans in the Governor's race, but not really in the US Senate race.  There we have one Democrat (Peltola), one main Republican (Sen, Sullivan), and two lesser Republicans.  The three Republicans are not likely to cooperate and tell the voters to rank the other two Republicans. But the 2024 numbers suggest that the most voters will rank a second choice. 

The US House race was the only statewide election in 2024 except for the presidential election.  I'm guessing the presidential election could have been RCV, but in any case Trump won a majority so if it was RCV, there was no need to go to the RCV round,  

My biggest concern here is that the politicians aren't going to let us actually use ranked choice voting because if they have two main candidates competing, they'll pull the one with fewer votes out.  The three Republicans on the ballot for governor are an exception to the  trend I'm calling out here.  Let's see if they cooperate and tell voters to give their second and third place votes the other Republicans.

[This is not as succinct (or probably as clear) as I wanted this to be, but I need to move on.]

[UPDATE: September 24, 2026:  I've responded to the anonymous commenter here.]

Heikes Would Ship Illegal Alien Criminals to Guantanamo Bay To Be Tried and Killed

I really want to do a post on Ranked Choice Voting and how candidates seem to not trust voters to actually use RCV the way it was intended.  But I got a bit side-tracked by Gerald Heikes' 5th place finish.  But it turns out to fit right in to what I want to write about RCV.  So let's leave it here as background for that future post.  (Not too far in the future I hope.)

With less than 1% of votes yet to be counted Gerald Heikes is in 5th place in the US Senate race, 19 votes behind the 4th place candidate David Leslie.  Leslie is listed as a Democrat who listed no funding or campaigning, but was heavily promoted by an Outside conservative PAC.  The top four candidates will be on the general election ranked choice ballot. (Unless they withdraw, in which case the next highest vote getter moves up.)  I'd note, there appear to be about 900 votes left to count.  

The Alaska Beacon (August 12, 2026) said 

"Of Right For Alaska’s $1.2 million in spending through Aug. 7, nearly $574,000 went to oppose Sullivan with $410,000 backing Republican Gerald Heikes and nearly $219,000 to support Earl “Skip” Southworth of the Alaskan Party – the successor to the right-leaning Alaskan Independence Party. An Earl Southworth of Dutch Harbor, Alaska, donated to Democratic nominee Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign in 2024 and to Democratic state Sen. Forrest Dunbar a decade earlier, FEC records show. OpenSecrets reached out to Heikes and Southworth but did not immediately receive responses from either." (emphasis added)

Below is from a 2020 interview when Gerald Heikes was running for the US House against Don Young.  It's worth reading his positions

From KTVF, Fairbanks (includes video):

Photo from Ballot Ready

"Published: Aug. 7, 2020 at 4:10 PM AKDT

FAIRBANKS, Alaska (KTVF) -

Republican Gerald “Jer” Heikes is running to represent Alaska in the U.S. House of Representatives. This seat is currently occupied by Don Young.

He said he is running because what he sees in Congress “doesn’t fit the narrative for anybody being truthful and honest.”

“I see every politician up there grandstand[ing] for some reason, then they lie about anything and everything to get what they want. That’s something I cannot do, is be able to lie or compromise because I’m a born-again Christian, which makes me a perfect target for the left, and lying is not part of life. If you can’t be truthful about what you’re doing and be honest in your opinions and what you have to say, then the deception won’t work for you as a human being going through life.”

According to Heikes, if he gets to Washington, there are things on the floor of the House that he would love to talk about. “This started out as a godly nation. Now we’re an ungodly nation, and everybody’s pointing fingers and they’re backbiting like little children and squabbling and they’re putting on shows and antics because of the camera. But they’re actually hiding their true selves in the lies that they’re putting forth.”

Heikes said he’d like to make Alaska a place where children can grow up and be safe. “We can have laws that protect us from illegal aliens -- that if you’re an American citizen and you’re attacked, or something happens to you and your family because of an illegal alien, they are shipped out of the country to like Guantanamo Bay. We’ll have like a three-judge military panel try them. And if they caused harm enough or they murder an American citizen, then they’ll be immediately sentenced to death, taken out in the back of the courthouse and done in. And there should be a cremation facility there, because there’ll be a lot of people going there.”

He added, “If they find that they are not worthy of death, then they’re deported back to their home country; but if they are found back in America illegally, then they go back and face the death penalty again and from the same three-judge court.”

Heikes would also like to see a federal loan for road-building in Alaska. “We need to build roads in Alaska. We need to build roads from Fairbanks to Nome, to Bethel, to branch out like that and fill in the blanks,” he said, adding, “A lot of people outside don’t realize that half the stuff is either flown in or barged into Alaska, and we need a decent roadway system that spans the whole state.”

He said, “From the first of January to the first of May, 9,900,000 babies were aborted worldwide. And since the COVID thing came on, there’s 150,000 deaths due to former ailments that people have and things of that nature. We spent trillions of dollars, yet we murder, at an unprecedented rate, the unborn. That has to stop.”

Heikes is running against John Nelson and Don Young on the Republican Primary Ballot on August 18th."

Here's (a bit of) what the Anchorage Daily News said about Heikes in 2024:

"Gerald Heikes, a Palmer resident and perennial candidate for public office in Alaska, has no money to spend on building a campaign website or advertising his positions. But a Democrat-backed group is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars highlighting Heikes’ anti-abortion stance in a quest to bolster Democratic incumbent Rep. Mary Peltola’s chances at reelection."  (emphasis added)

I've got more to say about the Alaska US Senate race and ranked-choice voting strategies in general.  Meanwhile, let's get this up so people know who this candidate is.  He still has a chance to be on the November ballot."

Here's the vote count as of August 20, 2026 1pm:

One Very Clear Winner - Prop 1 - Alaskans Want Spending Limits

 

For other election results, click here.  Just refresh the page to see if there are updates.  

I'd note Kreis-Tomkins is leading in the governor's race,  with Tom Begich, though the combined Republican numbers are formidable.  Peltola is slightly ahead of Sullivan, with Daniel J. Sullivan a distant third.  

But these are early numbers.  Only Ballot Measure one, to reinstate campaign finance limits is clearly going to win.  And some state legislative races with only one candidate.  A few others look conclusive, but the top four candidates move to the general election.  

Primary Election Day Tomorrow in Alaska and Prediction Markets

 Hard to believe it's finally here.  We didn't get any campaign literature in the mail today!!!

Probably the most uncertainty centers around the Governor's race.  There are lots of known candidates.  Which of the Republicans will end up in the top four?  And will other Republicans drop out in the belief that being on the ballot could siphon off votes from the top Republican and help the top Democrat.  Will the second Democrat, if there is one, also drop out?  

Ranked Choice Tabulation Questions

Given that we have Ranked Choice Voting, voters can rank all four candidates - first choice, second choice, third choice, fourth choice. If a candidate gets 50%+1 vote in the first round that candidate wins.   If no one gets over 50%, the candidate with the fewest first place votes is dropped and that candidate's second place votes are distributed to the other candidates.

DOE_Tabulation_60sec_HULU.mp4  Link to the video explaining how they count ranked choice voting from the Division of Elections.  Couldn't find a way to embed the video here.  [I did look, and it can be done, but I didn't find instructions I could use.)

I have questions about tabulating the votes, but tomorrow is election day and I'm not going to try to get answers from the Division of Elections until after the election. 

The video doesn't explain how, if ever, the third and fourth choice votes would count.  Perhaps if someone's choice for a second place vote has already been eliminated, the third place vote would count.  (I couldn't find anything that actually says that.)  And with only four candidates in the general, I don't think you would ever get to the fourth choice vote.  

Also, what if someone got no first place votes, but was the second place choice for all the other candidates?  That person would be eliminated on the first round and would never get the second place votes.  It's not a likely scenario, but something like that could happen.  

Ranked Choice Strategy Questions

In 2022, Sarah Palin and Nick Begich split the Republican vote in the general and enough second place votes gave Peltola the win.  

In 2024, two Republicans pulled out of the general, presumably because they didn't want to do the same thing, and Nick Begich beat Peltola.  But that year Trump was also on the ballot and that brought out lots of Republican voters.  (Total votes for US House:  2024 = 329,493;  2022=263,610) 

Ranked Choice Voting is supposed to overcome this sort of problem by giving voters the option to make second and third choice votes.  But not enough voters have done that.  Will they learn to do that in the future?  Are there good strategic reasons not to rank?  What are they?  Will there be candidates who urge their voters to choose Candidate B as their second choice?

The Spoiler Candidates and the Spoiler PAC Campaigns

My previous post was about Outside [Alaska lingo for outside of Alaska] PACs spending lots of money on fringe candidates - one from Arizona, one from South Dakota, and one Alaskan - in an attempt to get them onto the final four in the general.  

One of those candidates - Richard Grayson - has said he would withdraw if he were in the final four.  Today Grayson emailed me a link to a review of what the prediction markets are saying about the Alaska US Senate race.  There's a lot more discussion at the link, but here's the gist:

That's hard to read 

That was too small, and now it's too big, but the chart is in the link.  I've also looked at the Kalshi page on this race and it's clear I need to learn a lot more about prediction markets and what everything means.  I do suspect that a lot of people who are betting are not from Alaska and don't really know that much about our elections.  But I don't really know.  

The prediction markets didn't do that well in Michigan and Wisconsin.

In comparison, on June 23, 2026  I wrote:

"At this point, I''d guess that Peltola, Sen. Sullivan, and Kohlhaas* would be the top three, scooping up most of the votes.  As I look at the 2024 House race, the others won't get many votes.  Though I suspect Dustin Darden has run often enough that people will vote for him because they recognize his name.  And Daniel J. probably has a good chance to get votes too, for the very reasons the Sen. Sullivan campaign and the Republican Party of Alaska and the National Party want him off the ticket.  It would be between him and Darden for fourth place.  

Given that early polls show Peltola ahead of Sen. Sullivan, having Daniel J. on the November ballot would be a threat to Sen. Sullivan's reelection.  If Daniel J. made it to the general election, and there he pulled 5% of the vote from the Senator, it could easily be enough to give Peltola the victory.  Some might say that Peltola's ahead now, so she'd win either way.  I think that's counting your chicks before the eggs are laid.  

[*I'd mentioned Kohlhaas in an earlier paragraph as another candidate (Alaska Libertarian Party) who had run often enough that people knew his name."]

Tomorrow evening, and surely by Wednesday, we'll know.   

[This post has more of a deadline than most, so I'm going to post now without proofing as much as I normally would.  If I find typos etc., I'll fix them.  I won't change content, but if I do, like always,  I'll make it clear what I did.]

Are Richard Grayson and Carol Hafner on the ballot to confuse the voters and so should be removed?

 

Richard Grayson interview in Arizona 2024.  He's clearly doing this for giggles.  He says in the video that most of his voters were probably mental patients.  After watching the video, I even wonder whether he is even connected with the flood of flyers coming to left-leaning voters in Alaska that push Grayson as a progressive candidate on one side and trash Mary Peltola on the other side.  

I don't see a way to embed the video, but the link takes you to the video quickly.  He's somewhat of a goof-ball.  

Waterbiking

Regulars here know that there will be a bit more than just Waterbiking. 

Our kids gathered on Bainbridge Island last week for a family celebration.  We had a good time in pleasant weather, all the nicer knowing we were missing a week of rain in Anchorage.  The views from my window seat weren't spectacular on the way back yesterday.  As we got to Prince William Sound, we were already told to prep for landing early - trays up, electronics unplugged, etc.  Then the next 20 minutes or so were variations of gray clouds with one brief opening where I could see land below.  That darker stretch is Fire Island, but even parts of it are clouded over.  We did have a smooth landing.  

So I'd been wondering whether I would have decent biking weather to get to my dermatologist appointment today.  The weather app wasn't hopeful last night, but this morning when I opened the shades, there was even sunshine!  My doctor has moved since my last appointment.  He was in the Providence medical high rises.  Now he's in midtown - the modern glassy building on C St. between Northern Lights and Benson.  I noticed the sign in the elevator - Self Cleaning Buttons.  Never noticed a sign like that before.

So here, from Elevator Consultants Solutions:

"Key Highlights

• In today's world, nanoseptic self-cleaning buttons are changing the game for places lots of people touch.
• These innovative buttons clean themselves using nanoseptic technology, so there's no need to use regular cleaners on them.
• The magic behind their cleaning power is a powerful oxidation reaction from mineral crystals that get energy from light you can see.
• This process breaks down nasty stuff like organic contaminants into harmless things such as CO2, making everything safer and cleaner.
• Not only do they work well, but these buttons also last a long time. They're a solid choice for keeping germs at bay.
• With nanoseptic button covers, upgrading those high-touch spots becomes easy and does wonders for public health."

The office takes up the whole 8th floor.  My exam room was on the northeast corner.  I've reserved the room for all future visits.  

And then I was done, with the sun still shining.  So I headed off along C Street to Dowling to pick up the Campbell Creek south trail. 

The water was muddy and  high as it passed under C Street.  I was concerned about what the Arctic underpass would look like. With good reason. A biker and his dog came the other way.  Okay, let's do it.  

I came out the other side with wet feet - I'm guessing it was six or seven inches deep at the deepest point.   So, how is the Minnesota underpass going to be?  

Not as bad as Arctic, but it does go on a bit further on the other side.  

So where the trail ends I decided to go back on Dimond and get back to the trail at C Street. Dimond's
not the nicest biking environment, so I went exploring on Vernye Place, which quickly becomes Della and that connects with Runamuck Place.  

It's only a short block long and Wakefield is a dead end, between Dimond and Campbell Creek.

So back up to Dimond.  The sidewalk deadended near the Minnesota overpass, but a path went down to the bike trail on the other side of the bridge (so I didn't have to go through the puddles again.)  

At Arctic, to avoid the deep water, I went back up to Dimond where I saw this assortment of political signs:

This is why a lot of folks were upset when Matt Shultz pulled out of the US House race.  Here's Independent Bill Hill's sign up with a Sullivan (the Senator, I assume, not Daniel J.)  The Bronson and Church (for Governor) and McGuire and Rasmussen (for Governor}.  All the others are Republicans.  What is he telling Republicans that he's not telling Democrats?  Or does this mean the Republicans really don't like Rep. Nick Begich?

Because I also see Bill Hill signs next to Mary Peltola signs.  If he pulls it off, there will be some upset voters when he picks a side to caucus with.

At C Street, back down to the bike trail and home.  Well one more detour.  I'm sure the underpass at Old Seward Highway will be flooded, so I get off at the new bridge over Campbell Creek - which is 50th and cross Old Seward and get back on the trail on the other side of the bridge.  Sure enough, it's also got lots of water.  Plus it has lots of bumps.  

This is across the creek from the Arctic Road Runner.  

July has only gotten about three inches of rain so far.  While that's three times the normal rainfall, it's not really a lot of rain over three weeks, though much of it probably came this last week.  And I suspect there was more rain in the mountains where the creek originates.  

But I hope these flood zones are on the Municipalities fix list.  

It's dark and cloudy again as I finish this post at 3pm.  

Silence [UPDATE: Ballots Printed And Overseas Ballots Sent]

[See update below]

The Division of Elections said it had a June 28 deadline to print primary ballots. 

But then they took Daniel J. Sullivan off the ballot in the US Senate race and were challenged in court and required to put him back on by the Superior and then Alaska Supreme Court. 

Then a sample ballot appeared on their website which left off Daniel J.'s political party and added "Incumbent" to Senator Dan S Sullivan's name on the ballot.  (Honorifics are not allowed and someone checked the last four elections and reported that no one had 'incumbent' by their name.)

Since then there's been almost complete silence.  

• Were the ballots printed?  If so, what do they look like?
• Did Daniel J. file any sort of legal complaint?  
• What do the judges think about all this?  They said they'd trust the professionalism of the Division of Elections, but that was clearly a mistake.  

The only word has been from NBC saying the US Department of Justice and the Alaska Attorney General's office are investigating a conspiracy around putting Daniel J. on the ballot. Because he was trying to confuse the public.  I can think of others they should investigate first on that charge.   

Do you think the Republicans are worried about losing the Senate?

It's July 7 already and no word.  Yes, the July 4 holiday took up some time.  In fact the Division of Elections office in Anchorage was closed Friday AND Monday.  

[UPDATE:  July 7, 2026:  I stopped by the Anchorage Division of Elections again today to drop off a voter registration form. (I'm a voter registrar.)  The door was locked.  Entry required me to call them.

When the door finally opened, I handed off the registration form and I had two questions. 

1. Were the primary ballots printed?  The woman answered, "Yes and they were sent to overseas voters last week."  
2. My follow up question was: what did the Senate ballot say? "The sample ballot is on our website."  Below is a copy of the sample ballot for District 1. (They show the ballots for each district to show that the order of the names is rotated for each district as required by law.)

As you can see, Daniel J. Sullivan has Jr. after his name and his party was left off.  Dan S. Sullivan got to have both Republican AND "Incumbent" listed.  

The State law says:

" (4) The director may not include on the ballot, as a part of a candidate's name, any honorary or assumed title or prefix but may include in the candidate's name any nickname or familiar form of a proper name of the candidate.

(5) The names of the candidates shall be placed in separate sections on the state general election ballot under the office designation to which they were nominated. If a candidate is registered as affiliated with a political party or political group, the party affiliation, if any, may be designated after the name of the candidate, upon request of the candidate. If a candidate has requested designation as nonpartisan or undeclared, that designation shall be placed after the name of the candidate. If a candidate is not registered as affiliated with a political party or political group and has not requested to be designated as nonpartisan or undeclared, the candidate shall be designated as undeclared."

Therefore, as I read this, placing "Incumbent" after the current Senator's name would seem to fall into the category of 'honorary or assumed title'.  I believe it was the Chief Justice who raised this in the Supreme Court hearing.  Sen. Dan's attorney brushed it off.

And Daniel J.'s political party - Republican- should have been printed under his name.  No matter how much the GOP argue that he only recently registered as a Republican, there is nothing that addresses when one registered, except it has to be done before you turn in the forms for candidacy.  

Is Daniel J.'s attorney working on this?  I don't know.  This is where we are today, as far as I can tell.  

[UPDATE:  I did email Daniel J.'s attorney and he responded that he can't comment at this time.]

Related Posts:

June 22, 2026 Senator Dan Sullivan Does Not Want To Run Against Dan Sullivan [UPDATE] 

June 23, 2026 The Dan J Sullivan Removal From Ballot Hearing 

June 25, 2026  Daniel J. Appeal Of Division Of Elections Decision Plays Out In Nearly Empty Court Room

June 26, 2026 It's Almost 7pm -I Can't Find The Sullivan Decision - [Update - His Name Goes Back On The Ballot]  

June 28, 2026

Supreme Court Hearing On Daniel J. Sullivan v Alaska Division of Elections Appeal On Zoom Only

Monday, June 29, 2026   Alaska Division Of Elections v Daniel J. Sullivan At Supreme Court

Monday, June 29, 2026   Supreme Court Keeps Daniel J. Sullivan On The Ballot 

Tuesday, June 30, 2026  Division of Election's Sample Ballot Leaves Off Daniel J's Party Affiliation

Division of Election's Sample Ballot Leaves Off Daniel J's Party Affiliation

The Division of Elections has a Sample Ballot posted on its website.  I believe it went up last night after the Supreme Court hearing.  

(There is another list of Senate candidates which has a red "Denied" next to Daniel J. Sullivan's name.)

The listing is for Daniel J. Sullivan Jr.   There is no party listing.  He is the only candidate with no party listing even if it is just "(Undisclosed)."  I listened to the Court arguments yesterday and to part of the hearing again today.  It was my impression that the Court expected a party designation of Republican next to Daniel J.'s name. Though they never explicitly said so.  

My comment at the end of yesterday's post was that I had less confidence that the Division would do the right thing than the Court seemed to have.  The Republican Party, from the national level (the  National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC)  made the first complaint about Daniel J.  Sullivan being on the ballot) to the many states that sent in amicus briefs supporting the Division's decision to delete Daniel J. from the ballot, to the Alaska Republican Party which filed two more complaints, and whose members include Lt. Governor Dahlstrom (who oversees elections) and the Division head Beecher.  

And here we are.  Today's the day the ballots are scheduled to be printed.  The Division's attorney, Chris Murray, did say that if Sullivan doesn't like how his name appears on the ballot he can appeal it.  But, as Chief Justice Carney replied, the time is short.  

Here's the ballot that's up on the site now:  

Thank you to Matthew Beck who posted this last night on Bluesky

Below is my transcript of part of Monday's court hearing.  As I listened to it, I noticed several things.  

1.  Mr. Murray is good at saying he agrees with what a Justice just said, but then he twists it in his own favor.  

2.  The Justices - particularly Chief Justice Carney - appeared to believe that Daniel J. Sullivan had registered as a Republican before filing and that he should have that designation by his name.  Though Mr. Murray casts doubt on Daniel J's Republican credentials:"if or to the extent that he ever registered with the Republican Party  he did when he filed his declaration of candidacy"

3.  Mr. Murray points out he can be listed as a Republican or nothing at all.  He keeps that option open, though what I heard from the justices was that he was a Republican and should be listed that way.  

4.  Murray points out that if Sullivan doesn't like his designation, he can appeal it, but Chief Justice Carney immediately points out the time crunch.  

"Chief Justice Carney:  49:09  The Division’s proposal  not to list him as a Republican after certifying his declaration of candidacy as a Republican would appear to be a little outside its discretion, wouldn’t it?  Don’t they have to list him as Republican?

Chris Murray: I would respectfully disagree there and I would point you Madame Chief Justice to Alaska Statute 151530 Subsection  5.  If you look there, this talks about how the ballot is prepared.  What’s got to go on there, basically the Division must do and what the Division can do. And I would point you to the second sentence of that subsection. which says, if a candidate is registered as affiliated with a party or group it doesn’t - it doesn’t sound as if there is any debate here, Mr. Sullivan, if or to the extent that he ever registered with the Republican Party  he did when he filed his declaration of candidacy

Justice Henderson:  He registered

Murray:  Justice Henderson, I wanted to get to the next piece.

Justice Henderson:   I don’t see anything in this subsection that allows the Division to force someone to have a descriptor in terms of affiliation, political affiliation,  that is contrary to what they requested.

Murray:  So, there Your Honor, I agree with you.  And in our briefing we suggested that he be listed as non-partisan.  I will say that’s a product of speed, it’s simply not correct.  I think he could be listed as Republican or nothing at all.  That’s what could be done.  So, I think you make a very fair point there.  But I will say that when it comes to the partisan affiliation, the statute says it may be designated after the name of the candidate. 

Chief Justice Carney:  Well, if you journey back to felons in Outside prisons part of that appeal was that if the Democrats didn’t really want to associate with a felon in an Outside prison, right?  He got to appear on the ballot as a Democrat did he not?

Murray:  In that case again, there was never a challenge from, the Division never made any findings on that.  The context of the Beecher case was, can you elevate more than one from fifth place for the top fou, I know this court is very familiar with it.  You decided it.

Chief Justice Carney:  Absolutely.  But the Division’s briefing at the Superior Court there has multiple references to, for example on page 17 of his opposition to his motion below, “Mr. Hafner is qualified.  He correctly completed his declaration of candidacy.  That was as a Democrat. That was what he was listed ultimately, as a Democrat on the ballot.

Murray:  I also don’t believe there was any question    as a Democrat out of state.  Here again I would say that if the determination regarding how Mr Sullivan goes on the ballot that he doesn’t like,  he does have a right to challenge it.  I’d hate to do it, but he does have a right to challenge it.  We don’t deny that.    

Chief Justice Carney:  You may have noticed that the time is running short?

Murray:  There’s no question about that, Madame Chief Justice and I would also  like to echo what Mr. Robinson said that we appreciate both Judge Matthews below and this court’s expeditious hearing here.  We would ask the court, if it decides Mr. Sullivan has to go on the ballot, that it remand and let the division make the determination about how he goes on the ballot. If the court is unwilling to do that, we ask that the court direct us to do that, but we don’t think that’s this courts place"

I tried to call the number listed for Mr. Sullivan on the other sample ballot, but, understandably, it's blocking callers.  Will he take advantage of the appeal that Mr. Murray mentioned?  We'll see.  

Is this worth all the time we've spent on it?  The Republicans seem to think so.  Sen. Sullivan is listed as one of the more vulnerable Republican US Senators.  Having Republcan next to his name probably would get Daniel J. more votes.  If Sen. Sullivan is not reelected and a few other incumbent Republican senators lose, the US Senate would become majority Democratic and that would greatly change the direction of the country.  So it is a big deal.  

Related Posts:

June 22, 2026 Senator Dan Sullivan Does Not Want To Run Against Dan Sullivan [UPDATE] 

June 23, 2026 The Dan J Sullivan Removal From Ballot Hearing  

June 25, 2026  Daniel J. Appeal Of Division Of Elections Decision Plays Out In Nearly Empty Court Room

June 26, 2026 It's Almost 7pm -I Can't Find The Sullivan Decision - [Update - His Name Goes Back On The Ballot]  

June 28, 2026

Supreme Court Hearing On Daniel J. Sullivan v Alaska Division of Elections Appeal On Zoom Only

Monday, June 29, 2026   Alaska Division Of Elections v Daniel J. Sullivan At Supreme Court

Monday, June 29, 2026   Supreme Court Keeps Daniel J. Sullivan On The Ballot 

Tuesday, June 30, 2026  Division of Election's Sample Ballot Leaves Off Daniel J's Party Affiliation

Tuesday, July 7, 2026  Silence [UPDATE: Ballots Printed And Overseas Ballots Sent]

Alaska Division Of Elections v Daniel J. Sullivan At Supreme Court

AK Div of Elections v. Daniel J. Sullivan live at www.ktoo.org/gavel

Depending on whether I'm looking at the clock on my laptop, phone, or watch, it is now 10:07, 10:15, or 10:10 and I have the screen up but nothing has happened yet.  Oh, yes - now it says delayed start.  

[Screenshot from KTOO Gavel Alaska]  

 

Not sure what that means.  I was told the courtroom wouldn't be open today and I assumed it meant everyone was zooming in.  That was the case of the Superior Court hearing Thursday - none of the participants were there live, including the judge, but the courtroom was open and there were about a dozen people in the gallery.  

10:22 - Delay notice gone, Gavel banging.

Oh dear.  My notes are pretty sketchy.  I'm not sure I should leave them up.  The video is supposed to be up for anyone to listen to.  Let me try to get the gist up and then I'll decide whether my notes should go up as well.  

Basically, Chris Murray, attorney for the Division of Elections, began arguing that Sullivan is on the ballot to confuse the voters and so should be removed, and the justices are asking where it says that's a reason for taking him off the ballot.  

Aren't the voters smart enough?

Murray is standing hard that Sullivan was on the ballot only to confuse the voters and the Court keeps questioning him about that.  

[Left to right starting with top row:

Susan M. Carney, Chief Justice, Justice Jennifer Henderson;  Second row: Justice Jude Pate, Justice Aimee A. Oravec;  Attorney for Div of Elections: Chris Murray;

Third row:  Attorney for Daniel J. Sullivan] [Screenshot from KTOO Gavel Alaska]

[It was impossible for me to read their names correctly from the screen.  They were just too small, though clearer than the screenshot above.]

The justices seemed to come down pretty hard on that point.  

They also  questioned Jeffrey Robinson closely when it was his turn.  

My sense is that the decision to bump Daniel J. Sullivan from the ballot will not prevail.  That leaves questions about how his name will appear and how much the court will direct how his name will appear or whether they will leave it up to the Division of Elections.  

Some of the questions about the name:

1. Will it be Dan Sullivan, Daniel J. Sullivan?  Dan J. Sullivan?  His attorney seemed to want it to be as close to Sen. Sullivan's name as possible, while still be distinguishable.  
2. Will he be designated as a Republican?  It seems that he did officially change his party to Republican and so the Division would have to use that, but I'm not certain.
3. Will the Supreme Court tell the Division how to write his name and party, or leave that up to the discretion of the Division of Elections?  This wasn't clear.  Both attorneys said they trusted the Division to be professional.  Justice Matthews of the Superior Court instructed them.  I'm not sure that the Supreme Court will do the same.  Though there is very little time between now and when they start printing ballots tomorrow.  If the Division butchers his name and party designation, there will be no time to appeal.  

They promised to get the order out very quickly, but the opinion explaining their decision would come later.  

The recording of the session is up on KTOO Gavel Alaska and I've embedded it below so you can check my understanding of what's left with what they said.  I'll try to do the same.  

You should be able to click on the play button and listen yourself and I'll not post my sketchy notes of they arguments.

Chief Justice Carney at the end:  An extraordinary schedule.  We greatly appreciate your depth of arguments.  We will do our best to get at least an order out, will take longer to get opinion out.  Apologize for my computer,  Recessed.  

11:20 am

Related Posts

June 22, 2026 Senator Dan Sullivan Does Not Want To Run Against Dan Sullivan [UPDATE] 

June 23, 2026 The Dan J Sullivan Removal From Ballot Hearing  

June 25, 2026  Daniel J. Appeal Of Division Of Elections Decision Plays Out In Nearly Empty Court Room

June 26, 2026 It's Almost 7pm -I Can't Find The Sullivan Decision - [Update - His Name Goes Back On The Ballot]  

June 28, 2026

Supreme Court Hearing On Daniel J. Sullivan v Alaska Division of Elections Appeal On Zoom Only

Monday, June 29, 2026   Alaska Division Of Elections v Daniel J. Sullivan At Supreme Court

Monday, June 29, 2026   Supreme Court Keeps Daniel J. Sullivan On The Ballot 

Tuesday, June 30, 2026  Division of Election's Sample Ballot Leaves Off Daniel J's Party Affiliation

Tuesday, July 7, 2026  Silence [UPDATE: Ballots Printed And Overseas Ballots Sent]