Poor Trump backed Sarah Palin lost.........

[Goal-line]

..............her political comeback.  Maybe there really is a higher power?

 

https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/31/politics/alaska-house-seat-ranked-choice-ballots/index.html

[mrandyk]

I think it is the unique system Alaska employs that caused this. The Republican nominees won 59% of the vote in the general election - 31% for Palin (R), 28% for Begich (R), and Peltola (D) got 40%. They however revamped their state elections to ranked choice voting in 2020. Reading through all of it has been a bit confusing, but here is what I've gathered:

 

They now have open primaries. The top 4 vote getters, regardless of party, end up on the general election ballot. 2 Rs, 1 D, and 1 Independent came through.

 

The Independent withdrew afterwards. So in the general election you had 1 D and 2 Rs.

 

In the general election, if one wins a majority of the 1st place votes, they win the election. No one won a majority. So in this instance, they looked at the voters who picked the 3rd place candidate (Begich) as their 1st choice, and went to their 2nd choice on their ballot. Enough people picked Peltola (D) as their second choice rather than Palin (R). So, it seems that a notable number of people voted like this:

 

1. Begich (R)

2. Peltola (D)

3. Palin (R)

 

Enough conservative Alaskans decided that Begich (R) was the best candidate, but also that Peltola (D) was a better candidate than Palin (R). I'm sure Alaskans have a strong opinion on Palin. She has been gone for 13 years, was poorly received in her few years as governor, and was running mate for one of the last Republicans with a spine.

 

Under any system that I'm familiar with, we would have seen Palin running against Peltola, and Palin would have likely won. I applaud Alaska. Make the race something other than "the lesser of two evils" and we might start to win as a nation. 

[TGHusker]

Score 1 for Ranked Voting!

[BigRedBuster]