Lisa Murkowski is in a dead heat battle with Trump-endorsed Republican candidate Kelly Tshibaka for the Alaska Senate seat. (Under Alaskan election rules, the top four finishers in the primary advanced to the general election regardless of party.) The outcome won’t affect the partisan balance in the Senate, but it’s the difference between having someone in the seat whose shown at least some willingness to buck Trump and a blindly loyal sycophant.
I’d say Murkowski has a very good chance of winning, even if a little behind as the first choice of voters. That’s because of the Rank Choice Voting system they’ve got. I can’t imagine that most of the Dem voters’ second choices won’t be for Murkowski, and that should put her over the top.
I believe Murkowski has said that she’ll be voting for Mary Peltola next month. Alaska politics appear somewhat different.
However - last week’s highly regarded and generally accurate Selzer poll showed Franken 3 points back of Grassley, whuch is actually within the margin of error.
I’m not holding my breath thinking Iowans are going to turn out Grandpa Chuck, but it’s no longer a wild fantasy.
Alaska Survey Research (538) had a poll in the field Oct 19-22, and the ask the people polled for ranked choice, which is nice.
Round 1:
Murkowski 40.8%
Tshibaka 38.9%
Chesbro 16.4%
Kelley 3.9%
Buzz Kelley eliminated.
Round 2:
Murkowski 42.2%
Tshibaka 41.0%
Chesbro 16.9%
Patricia Chesbro eliminated
Round 3:
Murkowski 55.5%
Tshibaka 44.5%
Which agrees with what @dtilque posted above. Murkowski and Tshibaka seem to be close, but Chesbro voters break heavily for Murkowski when Chesbro is eliminated so the final round doesn’t end particularly close.
Here’s what my Twitter robots had to say today.
PredictIt has Nevada as a lost cause while 538 has it merely leaning red.
But if Nevada goes red, Dems need both GA and PA. PredictIt and 538 both have Georgia as a coin flip with slight dem edge. They are split (and almost mirror each other) in Pennsylvania (PI: 41.6% D, 538: 59.5% D)
True. From about 21:00 left to about 17:00 left, Nate Silver and Galen Druke talk about Ann Seltzer’s maverick history and success, and how most pollsters are afraid to buck a trend even if their data says to:
Everett Stern, who ran as a Republican in the Pennsylvania primary and lost, then ran as an independent in the general election, has dropped out and has thrown his support to Fetterman.
Fetterman needs all the help he can get. The debate showed that he’s nowhere near recovered from his stroke. Here’s a clip showing his verbal processing difficulties. How anybody could think that he’s able to competently do the job he’s running for is beyond me.
That may or may not be true. But there’s no way I’d accept a cite from RNC Research, which is a part of the Republican Party, as being unbiased.
As is this
I didn’t see the debate, but why would difficulty speaking make someone incompetent to be in office? Would it be the same for a blind or deaf person? An amputee?
Here’s the thing: I’m not remotely excited about Fetterman and I worry about his medical issues, but next to the lying, carpetbagging, snake-oil-selling, puppy-torture-condoning, moral bankrupt pile of excreta in the form of a man that is Dr Oz, Fetterman is goddamn JFK by comparison.
I watched the Fetterman/Oz debate last night. It was painful to watch both of them. Fetterman is having some difficulty still, and you have to feel for the guy. Oz is a smarmy asshole with a constant smirk on his face who thinks if you say “radical socialist” 75 times in an hour, you’re actually making a point.
Fetterman had a stroke. What’s Oz’s excuse?
A year from now Fetterman will be better. Oz will still be a grifting New Jersey quack.
there are 2 senators now that are recovering from strokes. the republicans are running walker, the finger they are pointing at fetterman…three are pointing back at them.
Star Trek’s Captain Christopher Pike would do a better job than that smirking shit-weasel Oz.
We can all smirk and snark over Fetterman being clearly preferable to Oz regardless of his health, but I’m worried that his performance in the debate is going to give R-leaning independents the excuse that they’re looking for to vote how they want to.
Who do you think is more competent? Fetterman or Herschel Walker?