Alaska’s Division of Elections released another 22,511 ballots on Friday evening, and Democrat Mary Peltola took about 59 percent of the new Senate votes, widening her lead over Republican Senator Dan Sullivan from 5,800 to 10,412 votes. The updated unofficial totals put Peltola at 138,240 votes and Sullivan at 127,828, with 279,334 ballots counted statewide and all 401 precincts reporting.
Peltola sits at 49.84 percent of first choice votes to Sullivan’s 46.09 percent, 445 votes short of the majority that would win the seat outright under state law. The division’s live results page displays her at 50.0 percent because it excludes write-in votes and rounds to one decimal place. About 10,500 ballots accepted by Friday afternoon were not yet in the results, including roughly 2,600 questioned ballots from the Anchorage area that have not been counted at all, and overseas ballots can still arrive through November 18. Peltola would need about 54 percent of the Senate votes still to be counted to clear 50 percent.
If she falls short, the race goes to a ranked choice tabulation on November 18, after the final count of absentee and questioned ballots. On the ballot level file the state posted Friday, Peltola would finish about 9,500 votes ahead of Sullivan in that tabulation on the ballots counted so far, up from about 4,900 on Thursday, according to Alaska News calculations. The Associated Press has not called the race.
The seat is the last unresolved Senate contest of the 2026 midterms and it fixes the size of the incoming Democratic majority, which stands at at least 55 seats. It also sets the arithmetic for the Senate Democratic leadership ballot next month: a candidate needs 28 votes to lead the caucus, or 29 if Peltola’s win brings the caucus to its full strength. Certification is targeted for November 25.