What Liz Cheney Might Do Next
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Nathaniel, you have a thousand books and you've moved twice in the past two to three years. It was not fun. Is your back okay? Do you do Pilates or physical therapy? I hired movers, so I didn't have to worry about it. Diligent enough to keep a thousand books, not diligent enough to move them himself. I mean, it's basically the ultimate nerd thing, right? Own a thousand books and be too weak to lift a box of them.

Hello and welcome to this primary reaction edition of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast. I'm Galen Druk. Last night was a big test for some big names in the Republican Party in Wyoming and Alaska. Most notably in Wyoming, Representative Liz Cheney lost her primary to Harriet Hageman by even more than expected.

Of the 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump after January 6th, we can now definitively say that only two will advance to the general election this fall after the rest have either retired or lost their primaries. But this was the expected outcome for Cheney, and she didn't appear to be running to win. She was running to send a message about Trump. So the question remains, what does she do with that message now?

And in Alaska, we're still awaiting final results, but the picture from the night is coming into focus. Senator Lisa Murkowski and her main Republican opponent will both advance to the general election. It seems like Murkowski may have been saved by rank choice voting.

And speaking of ranked choice voting, thanks to that system, we won't know who won the special election in the state and what the future holds for Sarah Palin until later this month. Let's discuss it all. And here with me to do that are elections analyst Nathaniel Rakich. Hey, Nathaniel. Hey, Galen.

All right. As usual, I have to ask you, how late were you up last night? I was up until 2:30-ish. OK. OK. All right. That's pretty late. That's what happens. Yeah. Alaska and Hawaii. Thanks, Alaska. Those are the worst.

Also here with us is elections analyst Jeffrey Scali. Hello, Jeffrey. How are you? And how late did you stay up last night? I'm fine. And I was determined to not stay up for the first drop of the last results. I just couldn't do it. So hats off to Nathaniel. Jeffrey, I'm going to need to insist on you handing in your election nerd card. Hand it over. I knew I had to deal with this stuff in the morning. So I just I was like.

Fine. You got to sacrifice your body for the elections. Oh, OK. I'm having flashbacks to 2020. I should say, and also speaking of flashbacks to 2020, for those watching on YouTube, Jeffrey is not in a hostage situation. He just moved. So congratulations on the move, Jeffrey. I hope Vermont treats you well.

Well, and I hope you find your microphone and your lights and all of the other things... In a box somewhere. Anyway, also here with us is politics and tech reporter Kaylee Rogers. Hey, Kaylee, how are you? Were you up late? I'm great. No, I was not up late. I went to bed after we shuttered the live blogs around 1030, 11.

With Alaska, you know, so much we still don't know, even now, the following morning. So I wasn't going to bother staying up. Sorry, Nathaniel. I have no regrets. Nathaniel's like, OK, whatever. Screw you guys. And then I was up pretty late. I was up until two. I saw the Alaska, some Alaska results come in before I went to bed. So can I keep at least half of my nerd badge? You may. All right. Thank you. But let's talk about Wyoming first.

So ultimately, the polls showed Liz Cheney losing somewhere in the range of 25 points heading into the night. What ultimately happened? Well, she lost by more than that. It looks like her margin at this point is close to 40 points. So she is a little under 30 percent in payback.

Hageman is at about two thirds of the vote. So we knew that Cheney was in a lot of trouble and we knew that she was going to lose. I think like the margins made a little surprising that it's like quite this big, but at the same time, like we knew it wasn't going to be close.

I mean, by the end, to Galen's point, she wasn't even playing to win. She aired this ad featuring her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, who was basically looking at the camera and saying Donald Trump is the worst thing ever to happen to our republic, which is just not a message that is going to get you votes in a Republican primary in Wyoming.

you know, if she had actually maybe tried to win, I bet she would have done better. But like, in many ways, this is like the purest example of like a true anti-Trump Republican versus a, you know, a pro-Trump Republican and how that would turn out if everybody leaned into that. Right. I think once the pool of candidates narrowed and Hageman became the clear frontrunner, Cheney really kind of

put her efforts into something else rather than trying to hang on to power. And it's interesting too, because this also plays against the narrative of Trump, you know, desperately trying to cling to power, contesting the results of the elections.

Obviously, Cheney went the exact opposite direction and was quick to concede and clearly say that the election was over and her opponent had won. You know, she made a big point of that, which is normally just typically what a candidate does. But obviously, in this case, it was also a sort of symbolic thing.

prod at Trump. Yet another one from Cheney. Yeah, her concession speech came almost immediately as soon as the networks had projected the race. Clearly, she had planned this out for some time. She gave a somewhat lengthy speech

sort of sweeping speech where she talked about the Civil War and a moment to decide and things like that. It was set in the hills out in the country in Wyoming with lots of American flags in the background. You know, if you squinted, you could picture someone, you know, running for president in Iowa. And it is sort of take season on that point. And we will get to those. But before we do, we've been tracking how

how election denialism is playing into these primaries. And it's clear where Liz Cheney stood on this. You know, we've seen her in the January 6th hearings in prime time. But what role did this actually play in this primary? What was Harriet Hageman's position on the 2020 election? And did that seem to ultimately be motivating voters here?

Yeah, I mean, I think it was probably less specifically the issue of whether the election was stolen and more about this broad idea of support for Trump, which, of course, especially in Cheney's case, is typified by opposition to, you know, January 6th and, you know, the Stop the Steal movement. Hageman did eventually come out saying that the 2020 election was rigged. Her exact quote was,

Absolutely, the election was rigged. It was rigged to make sure that President Trump could not get reelected. But she said that fairly late in the campaign. And I think it was the kind of thing where, you know, she was doing a lot of winking at it. Everybody kind of knew where she stood. They certainly knew that she was a Trump ally and was, you know, very Trumpy and kind of like incendiary in her rhetoric. But I think it was more about Cheney and how she was reelected.

again, being so vocal about what a threat to democracy Trump was and her, you know, not just necessarily saying that the 2020 election was legitimate because we've seen Republican candidates win their primaries in spite of having that position, but going beyond that and saying that Trump's efforts to overturn it were a crisis, were, you know, dangerous, that he was, you know, an autocrat. And that is just a level of

personal criticism of a figure who is obviously still beloved by almost all Republican voters. And that was just beyond the pale for them. Yeah, I think that it goes way beyond just had she simply said like, no, I think that Biden legitimately won and left it at that. It wouldn't have been this crisis. What we saw was her becoming sort of the chief critic within the Republican Party of Trump.

of his efforts to claim the election was stolen. Her role on the January 6th committee has been prominent as the vice chair. She's taken a leading role in a lot of the hearings. You know, she has minced words in what she believes that the hearings are showing about Trump's behavior and the threat that she perceives him to be with these efforts.

I mean, this is anecdotal, but if you check out some of the, you know, diner and county fair reporting that was happening in Wyoming prior to the primary, a lot of voters cited the January 6th committee as like sort of salt in the wound. They felt betrayed by Cheney because they support Trump

And her taking such a concerted effort, a formal effort to kind of bring him down in their eyes was seen as a betrayal. And they really wanted to punish her for that. Although we should also say, you know, the CES survey basically fields this huge survey that asks Americans across the country whether or not they support or approve of the job their congressional representative is doing. And late last year, so before the January 6th hearings,

She ranked as the least popular member of Congress in the entire country. Her approval rating was in the 20s and that had dropped 40 points from the year before. So immediately, you know, prior to January 6th. So it seems like, you know, her impeachment vote and everything that happened in 2021 alone was enough to maybe, you

make it impossible for her to win reelection in Wyoming. But of course, as you mentioned, salt in the wound. Kayleigh, we've been tracking, as I said, where Republican candidates stand on the issue of the 2020 election.

So we've mentioned in the past that around 50 percent of nominees at least question the legitimacy of the election. What percentage out and out say, like Liz Cheney has, that Biden is the legitimate winner of the election? There aren't questions. There was no fraud to the degree that would have changed the outcome of the election in any of the states where it was even close. How big is the pool of similar candidates here?

to Cheney, at least on that position. Right. So out of a little over 450 Republicans who've won their primaries, 50 have accepted the legitimacy of the 2020 election without any reservations. That's about 11% of total nominees. And then another 11% have accepted the legitimacy with some kind of reservation. So they're like, yes, Biden legitimately won. But, you know, there was a lot of questions or but

you know, voters are concerned, sort of some kind of asterisk to their acceptance of it. So that's sort of compared to the roughly 50% who have at least questioned the results and not accepted them. And are there any trends in terms of who has been able to tell voters, you know, Biden is the legitimate winner and still win their primary? Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, the main trend that I see is that these nominees, these candidates don't dwell on the issue. Oftentimes, the only reason we know where they stand on it is because like local media has directly asked them, for example, in a survey of all the candidates. And they say, do you think that Biden legitimately won the election? And they say yes, and kind of nothing else. You know, they're not going into it. They're not criticizing Trump. They're not criticizing other Republicans for playing into the idea or endorsing the idea. They're kind of just like,

staking their claim and then moving on or, you know, trying not to dwell on the issue. And I think that that's worked well for the candidates that have won. And that's different from, say, a Democratic candidate who might say, yes, Biden won. And also, it's crazy that these Republicans are challenging it. It's a threat to democracy, all this other kind of rhetoric around it. One example I like to give, because I feel like it's kind of typical, is Kay Granger, a representative in Texas, who, like, right after the election started,

was quoted in the local paper saying, like, you know, we need to move on. The election's over. And that's kind of it. She hasn't said anything much since then. She's not hammering on this. She hasn't said the election was stolen. She's avoided all that rhetoric. But that's, you know, she staked her position early on and then kind of left it alone. And she won her primary.

So, Jeffrey, as I mentioned, of the 10 House Republicans who ultimately voted to impeach Trump, now only two are advancing to the general election.

Same question to you. What trends have you seen in terms of why they were able to advance where the other eight haven't or haven't tried? Well, I think there's some conversation around the fact that the two who did survive to advance, David Valadao and Dan Newhouse, are both in states that use top two primaries. So instead of having a party primary where

All the candidates running are from the same party, and most of the voters casting ballots in that primary are either registered with that party or identified with that party. And obviously, it depends state to state how the rules work. Whereas in the top two system, you've got all the candidates on the same ballot, all voters, regardless of party,

registration or identification or what have you, cast a ballot, vote based on that group of candidates. So to some extent, actually, this is why we even can sometimes use that top two primary vote as at least a little bit of a signal of what's going on, what might happen in the general election. So those two guys did manage to survive. And I think the top two primary may have helped them a little bit. But I do think we have to be careful to not assign too much

Um, causation. Yeah, exactly. I think causation here is, is limited only in the sense that they were also helped out by the nature of their opponents. And the other person who was running, who, who voted to impeach Trump, um, in a top two primary, Jamie Herrera Butler, she lost very narrowly. She finished third in her top two primary. And so what also mattered, I think, was the quality of the candidates running against them and getting a little lucky in regards to how the votes split, uh,

among voters who voted for other Republican candidates. Do we expect these two to be in Congress next January, which is to say, will they win their general elections? So Newhouse, because he is facing a Democrat in what is the reddest seat in Washington state, is almost certain to win. There's no reason to think that a Democrat is going to beat him in a very red seat. However, Valadao

is in a pretty 50-50 race. I mean, based on our election forecast, it's more or less a pure toss-up right now against State Assemblyman Rudy Salas, who's the Democrat.

So it's possible that Valdeo could lose in the general election, that Newhouse would be the only House Republican left who voted to impeach Trump. It's worth saying that, you know, there's a lot to run on as a Republican if you want to. You know, we are experiencing 40 year high inflation. Of course, immigration is still a hot button issue. Schooling and covid, you know, are not that far in the rearview mirror.

Looking at ads and how candidates are campaigning, you know, we're focused on this from a data perspective and trying to nail people down because we think that it's important how people feel about, you know, the legitimacy of past elections could affect how they behave surrounding future elections.

And so it's a fundamental question for a site that covers elections and democracy ultimately. But looking at the full cornucopia of how candidates are running campaigns, how large does it loom and what other issues are coming to the fore? Well, obviously it depends on the given primary. I mean, if you have a candidate who's sort of favored in a Republican primary, like an open seat race or something,

That candidate – obviously, if Trump has endorsed that individual, if they're running an ad, they'd love to mention that. But I think they also are already thinking – if it's a competitive seat, they're already thinking about the general election. They might be talking about –

you know if they're in like arizona the arizona sixth comes to mind it's like an ad might for a republican might talk about like immigration because obviously it's a big issue in a border state but also like talking about biden's inflation this biden's economy that so you're already sort of thinking about the general election dynamics there and trying to make that a major issue whereas if it's like a deep red seat how trumpy can you make yourself out to be obviously if trump is endorsed you yeah bring that up of course but then also things about like

as always supported Donald Trump was like, I don't know, county party chair for Donald Trump's 2020 campaign. You know, how can you connect yourself to Trump is like a big goal. So it also depends on sort of the nature of the seat you're running in. And you might hear the words like election integrity or election security in an ad that's in like a deep red seat where a lot of Republicans are trying to out-Trump the other. Yeah, I would say while they're

is a significant number of nominees who question the legitimacy of the 2020 election. The ones who made it like sort of central to their campaign are the sort of a small handful of those. So like the Carrie Lakes, the Doug Mastriano's, that's like the kind of stand out and have really focused on 2020 as like part of their campaign. The rest of them, it's certainly part of the rhetoric, but they're spreading a lot of

seeds, I guess, and talking about other issues as well. To be fair, those candidates do as well. But as far as the ones where you're like, this is a candidate who is an election denier, and that's like their defining quality, that's sort of a smaller pool.

Well, both Lake and Mastroianna are already in their general election campaigns now, and we're getting general election polling in both of those states for the poster children of denying the legitimacy of the 2020 election and sort of talking about how you might do things differently the next time around. Does that seem to be appealing to a mass audience? What's the forecast say?

I think to some extent it's still a little unclear. It is true that Josh Shapiro, the Democrat nominee in Pennsylvania, seems to be leading Doug Mastriano in most polling. But the range of the results is pretty sizable. Some have it a bit closer. Some others have put Shapiro very far ahead, including a Republican-sponsored poll that came out just yesterday.

That seems a little unlikely to be that uncompetitive. But how many points was he leading by? Oh, it was like 15 or something like that. Just given the nature of Pennsylvania, I have a hard time believing that you're going to have a double digit margin in Pennsylvania. So at this point, it seems that Mastriano is underperforming where you might expect a Republican to perform in a midterm year with a Democrat in the White House. Like Republicans should be looking at Pennsylvania as like

this is our shot to win this very competitive, traditional toss-up state. And yet instead, between the governor and Senate races, they look to be trailing in both. Although, again, I think there is a chance that a fair number of Republicans haven't fully consolidated behind these candidates and that it could still end up being very close and they could even win. So I'm cautious about some of this polling. I just have a hard time believing Pennsylvania is not going to be competitive.

All right. Well, I said that it was take season when it comes to what comes next for Liz Cheney. So let's discuss.

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If you were watching the news last night as Liz Cheney conceded her race in Wyoming, I think there was a lot of speculation. The imagery, as I mentioned, sort of suggested perhaps something presidential. What are all of your thoughts in terms of where Liz Cheney goes from here, given the race that she ran? Her political career is over, whether she recognizes that or not. You know, she did hint on

on Wednesday morning at running for president. But just look at the result yesterday in Wyoming. She is not going to do well in a Republican primary. And I guess she could theoretically run as an independent or a Democrat, but those would be equally doomed endeavors, I think. I mean, look, we've talked about this. We talked about this in 2020 when there were people potentially challenging Trump for renomination. Remember Bill Weld? Like, you know, there is not a large anti-Trump

Lane in the Republican primary. And what's more, it looks like that lane is going to be crowded like Larry Hogan, the governor of Maryland, who is also no fan of Trump. He has visited Iowa. New Hampshire has really not been shy about his interest in running for president. That seems like it's going to happen. And so if Hogan and Cheney and, you know, I don't know, maybe somebody like Adam Kinzinger or somebody all run and they split what's already a very small pool of votes, they're going to be nonfactors in the race.

To me, Nathaniel, though, it sounds like Liz Cheney probably knows this and is more thinking about how she can just prevent Trump from being president again. So on one hand, that could involve running in a Republican primary to just sort of be on the stage and try to make a point. Although you can also imagine a world in which the RNC creates rules that would keep Liz Cheney off of a debate stage or something like that.

So that's, you know, that is maybe one avenue, but perhaps the other avenue is running some kind of independent conservative campaign to try to siphon Republican votes from Trump in battleground states in a general. Yeah, I guess running as an independent would maybe accomplish that. But in terms of running in a Republican primary, the more candidates who run, the more likely it is that Trump wins. If she really wants to stop Trump from winning the Republican nomination, she should endorse Ron DeSantis.

I don't think he wants her endorsement. Right, exactly. I was going to say, I'm not sure that's palatable to either side. Yeah, I think ultimately this would be about staying kind of relevant on cable news and, you know, maybe selling a book and, you know, cementing her legacy as she hopes the, you know, last quote unquote reasonable Republican or whatever.

Yeah, Nathaniel, I think to your point, it seems to me that the Republican Party, like the RNC, is going to try to do everything it can to keep someone like Cheney off the stage. Didn't they publicly censure her? There's just not much appetite within the Republican Party to have someone who is an out-and-out Trump critic on stage. And maybe they would let Hogan in, but Cheney, because of just her very vocal confrontation with Trump, would...

persona non grata. So to me, I assume that what she's thinking about here is potentially an independent run, because that way you get around. I mean, granted, it's not like it's easy to mount an independent run. And you have to know, well, A, I'm going to lose, but

She has lots of rich friends who can give her money and she can put together the campaign apparatus necessary to get on the ballot in most states. And maybe she wins 2 percent here, 3 percent there, you know, because she does have a lot of name ID. People will be aware of her. And it would be sort of McMullen-esque in 2016. Maybe there's a state like Utah where she wins.

gets 9% or something just because her message is more attracted to a certain type of conservative, if not most Republicans. And she did raise $14 million in her reelection campaign that she basically she spent almost none of it to the point of, you know, she wasn't running to win. She didn't spend the money she raised on the race that she lost.

she can use that money. Yeah, exactly. To your point about the two or 3% that she could get here or there, like who do you think she would be getting that vote from? Yeah, that's a great point, Galen. I mean, I would imagine most of those votes are people who would go for Biden in the end. They'd be kind of the wealthy suburbanites who have moved toward Democrats in the age of Trump. Like Cheney has staked herself out so much as an anti-Trumper

That I can't imagine that people people type of people who would vote for her are people who would otherwise vote for Trump in her absence Do you think though if Cheney genuinely wants to stop Trump like that's her only goal? would she be better off kind of going away and Maybe quietly behind the scenes raising funds funneling support behind say DeSantis Yeah, I don't think she will but if we're well, I don't think she's gonna fund support to DeSantis I think Hogan though

She's been asked about this, and she has said that she would have a difficult time supporting DeSantis, given the extent to which DeSantis has aligned himself with Trump. I'm paraphrasing, but that was pretty much what she said. I'm speaking theoretically, not what I think she'll actually do. So I guess it's like whether maybe in a world that doesn't exist, but... I guess for me, I think I agree with Nathaniel that

It is possible that who she takes from, quote unquote, is is unclear. But I'm not actually sure that she would be taking from any Democrats at the end of the day. Maybe. Yeah, maybe some some independent types. I guess to me, though, it's like at the end of the day, most voters understand that it's a two party battle.

So, like, we're talking about very small amounts, but we know that they can matter in some cases. So I guess it's just a question of, I mean, maybe there's some strategic element of it that she only gets on the ballot in certain states where she thinks that maybe she would take more from Trump here. Maybe she avoids certain swing states, but picks out a couple states.

marginal states where she thinks, well, if I could take a little from Trump here, maybe I actually helped the Democrats' chances of winning. It's, of course, very hard to say at this point. I just think that she has such a conservative record outside of the Trump opposition. Maybe she's more conservative than McMullen, you know, in terms of just how that played out.

Well, with that in mind, I mean, you know, what she wants is, I'm assuming here, a return to a Republican Party that no longer exists, not for Democrats to succeed and continue to be in power. I don't think that's like her ultimate goal.

Yeah, that's a good point, Keely. And I mean, that is a Herculean task, obviously. Now that I think about it, the best thing for her to do would be to support someone like Larry Hogan, for the anti-Trump Republicans to get together in a room, decide, okay, one of us, who's the strongest one of us?

That person is going to run. They run. The other ones work behind the scenes, raise money and everything like that. If somebody like that can, you know, they're not going to win, I don't think. But if they can demonstrate that there is some appetite, you know, maybe do something

Interestingly, in New Hampshire or something like that, that could deal a blow to Trump. I think disappearing is maybe bad because it basically is an admission of defeat. Whereas, you know, if they kind of stay and fight the good fight, even if it's doomed, they can maybe make it socially acceptable, basically, for Republicans to say, no, it's not OK for Trump to be acting like this. Yeah. You know, there's also maybe even like a larger issue.

goal or larger project that Cheney could be a part of, which is to find certain races. And I'm not saying this would be easy, but find certain races for the House or Senate and try to develop sort of a broader...

like small d democratic coalition where you know it's a really conservative state so it's almost certainly going to elect a republican if you have a standard republican versus democrat matchup however if the democrats and some independents and some republicans who aren't big on trump for instance were to coalesce into some sort of like independent conservative

Democratic fusion ticket kind of situation, that candidate might at least make things interesting. You know, it's not like Mike Lee is probably going to lose in Utah Senate race this year.

But the race is interesting because Evan McMullin is essentially trying to do that. And it's only interesting because it's only interesting because of that. If it were just a standard Democrat versus Lee situation, the race would be a complete nothing burger. And I'm not saying it's going to even be that close. I just think that we can even discuss it because of that's going on. So if you think about like a house race in Wyoming in the future or Idaho or what have you, like some deep red sea race,

I just wonder if that's another thing that if she wanted to spend some time and energy on, that would be an interesting one. Well, you could even say that that's what's happening with Lisa Murkowski in Alaska. Segway opportunity. I was going to say, she could put ranked choice voting on the ballot in places like Wyoming and Idaho. I

I did want to mention before we do actually move on to Lisa Murkowski and we should move on to Alaska is that, you know, if Cheney were to run as an independent conservative in 2024, who she would appeal more to one in recent polling, we've seen that when you ask Americans how they think of Liz Cheney's performance in the January 6th hearings, her approval rating amongst Republicans is in the teens. Her approval rating amongst Democrats is a majority. So she got some like,

I think around 55% of Democrats approve of the job she's doing. I think that gives you some sense of who she is appealing more to, at least in this iteration of Liz Cheney. At the same time, though, we many, many years ago on this podcast did an audio documentary about the role that Ross Perot played in 1992.

And while we can pretty decisively say that he didn't alter the outcome of that election in the sense that he took equally from both sides and Bill Clinton still would have won,

The argument that sort of like true believers that Ross Perot spoiled the election would make is that when there is an independent candidate, they completely change the dynamics of the race so that vote intention on election day doesn't really reflect what vote intention might have been like had that independent not run. And you can imagine a world in which

Someone whose sole purpose for running is to bash Trump changes the dynamic because the media will be sort of like more than happy to talk to her, to interview her, to give her airtime, while the Democrat, whoever that might be, would be free to run on issues to a larger extent than they might if asked.

that person were in the race. And then a lot of the conflict, if Trump is running as the Republican, would happen between the independent conservative and Trump himself. And like the Democrat could kind of make themselves look as if they're above the fray. So this is all hyper speculative. And we may never get to a point where any of this analysis even matters. But these are things to consider beyond the immediate

polling. But there you have it. The polling says one thing. Maybe the dynamics would suggest another. I mean, I think that's a fair point, Kaelin. But I also think it's the other candidates act differently when like Ross Perot, who got like, what, 30 percent of the vote, whereas Liz Cheney, I would be surprised if she gets more than five percent of the vote. Like, I don't think they're going to have to react to her that much. I think they can ignore her, although Trump probably won't knowing him. Yeah, he'll take the bait. And that's what she would hope for, I would think.

All right. Let's talk about Alaska. We should have so much time talking about Wyoming. I love it, though. And we also don't have maybe nearly as much to say about Alaska, given where the results stand at this moment. But Nathaniel, you were up until 2.30 looking at those results nonetheless. So tell us what we should know. I think there's more to say about Alaska than there is about Wyoming. Wyoming was open and shut. It was a blowout. Alaska is interesting. OK, then I take it back. I take it back. So.

So in Alaska right now, an estimated 69 percent of the final vote is reporting. And Lisa Murkowski is in first place with 44 percent. Kelly Chewbacca, Trump's endorsed candidate, is in second place with 40 percent. And right now, the third and fourth slots look like they're going to go to Democrat Pat Chesbrough and Republican Buzz Kelly. But they are both in single digits and are not going to be factors in the race.

Now, I think this is very interesting because Murkowski is doing better than I was expecting. And I think any lead for her in the first round or the primary is a really good sign for her. And in fact, she's probably even going to grow her lead because Alaska accepts mail ballots until 10 days after the election. So more mail ballots are going to be added to this total. As we know, mail ballots lean Democratic, they lean liberal. So I wouldn't be surprised if Murkowski gets up above

45%, tickling 50% by the end of this. And of course, in the general election, she needs to reach 50% in the ranked choice rounds. And you look right now,

The Democrat past Chesbrough has 6 percent. Murkowski is at 44 percent. They already are constituting basically a majority, 50 percent. So once that Democrat is eliminated, you figure that the vast majority of her votes are going to go to Murkowski. So I'm looking at these numbers. And if I'm Murkowski, I am really happy.

Yeah. And Nathaniel, to your point of also potentially Murkowski's numbers improving, I think you've also looked at some of the data about where votes are outstanding or where like the expected vote is not quite up to, you know, it's still pretty low at this point in terms of what's reporting. A lot of it's from like the most...

peripheral rural parts of Alaska, which some of those areas have sizable Alaska native populations who have tended to be very supportive of Murkowski. Also, just in general, I think that the outstanding vote is potentially good for her and even beyond the mail ballot question, essentially. So I do think that, to your point, that the numbers look

Pretty good for her in that there was plenty of reason to think that she would be sort of in second here, and yet she's in first and probably will finish the primary first.

And can we tell anything about where those votes are coming from in terms of partisanship? Because I think Lisa Murkowski did make the bet that she would lose amongst Republicans, but that if she could consolidate enough support amongst independents and Democrats, she could remain a Republican senator, ironically. Can we sort of break down her coalition at all?

Yeah, I mean, I think at this point, one of the issues with sort of trying to figure out those in Alaska versus other states is that Alaska does not report election returns by county or county equivalent. They usually report them actually by election district. And of course, election districts change the usual districting cycle. But what I think we can say is that we knew in pre-election polling that a lot of Borkowski's support was coming from Democrats and independents and not a lot of Republicans.

So between looking at what's going on in an election we haven't even talked about yet, which is the special election, where Mary Patola, the lone Democrat in that race, is getting her support and where Murkowski is getting a lot of support, there is overlap there. And so it's pretty easy to see that Murkowski – her coalition has to involve some Republicans to be in this position because Alaska is a Republican-leaning state.

But she gets a ton of support from independents and Democrats, and especially in a state like Alaska where, look, a lot of people who say who are registered as independents actually lean one way or the other. But I think we can say that Alaska has to have one of the largest independent streets of any state in this country. States with party registration has basically the largest percentage of registrants who are not registered as Democrats or Republicans. So her

Her kind of appeal, I think, is very uniquely suited to the state that she's coming from. And clearly she understands that. Well, and the fact that Alaska has this top four primary as opposed to partisan primaries is,

really kind of saved her. But had it been a Republican primary, the results would have been a lot different for Murkowski. We'd be looking at another writing campaign by Murkowski, because I think why not try it again, right? She managed to succeed in 2010, losing the Republican primary, a traditional party primary and getting people to spell her name more or less correctly and managed to win. So she probably would have done it again. But that's a huge undertaking.

Or maybe more to the point, we can say that election systems might even affect governing behavior. I don't know that Lisa Murkowski would have taken the path she did in the Senate if she knew that she had to win a Republican primary. Either that or she would have decided to change her party to independent and then pursued something more like this.

But I think that the specific situation that Lisa Murkowski is in today is a result of, you know, the electoral system that she lives in. That's an argument for it or against it, depending who you're talking to.

Well, one point for election nerds who say systems matter. Well, no, no. I mean, Galen, to your point, I mean, you're almost creating with the ranked choice voting system and maybe the particulars of Alaska and Alaska politics, you're almost creating a coalitional system. And we know that in countries that use parliamentary systems that are multi-party systems, coalitional politics creates different incentives for trying to work together, for trying to find common ground, for trying to like

figure out some way to govern and what kinds of policies to promote and sell yourself to voters with. So I think your point is spot on if we try to kind of apply that logic to what's going on in Alaska. All right. Well, we have one race to end on, which is the special House election. And then, of course, the primary for that same seat, which Sarah Palin famously is running in. Nathaniel, what should we know about that race?

Yeah, so that race is also super interesting. So as of right now, the Democrat Mary Peltola has 38% of the vote. Sarah Palin, who of course is a Republican, has 32%. And the second Republican, Nick Begich, is at 29%. So it's a fairly close race.

And there's a lot of uncertainty, I think, because, again, you know, there are more mail ballots that have yet to report. And there are two things I'm looking for here. One is who is going to finish in second place. So that is only what, three, three and a half points separating Palin and Begich. That is a gap that Begich could make up. You would expect probably these later counting points.

ballots to be better for him because he's more moderate than Palin is. And of course, that matters because in the ranked choice tabulations, which are going to be taking place on August 31st after every ballot is counted, the third place candidate will be eliminated. And so if that's baggage,

then because he's kind of more moderate, at least he's the median candidate in this race, a good chunk of his support might go to the Democrat, Mary Peltola. If Palin is the one who's eliminated, you would expect, because she's very conservative, that almost all of her support will go to her fellow Republican baggage. So if Palin is the first one eliminated, if Palin is in third place, you would expect that

her votes plus Begich's votes would put Begich over the top and make Begich win. But if Begich is the one eliminated, you could see a scenario where the Democrat actually wins this House seat in Alaska, which of course would be historic. And so that leads me to the other thing I'm looking at, which is what's the final number that Peltola is going to end up

bat. If she's above, say, 40%, that's probably within enough striking distance where if Begich finishes third, she could be over that 50% threshold once it's just a head-to-head between her and Palin. And when do we find out the result? The end of the month? Yeah. So most absentee ballots in Alaska, as I said earlier, are due 10 days after the election, which I think is August 26th.

But then overseas absentee ballots aren't due until August 31st and, of course, before the ranked choice tabulations happen because it's not just the who's in first place, but who's in second place and third place and stuff like that. You have to have every ballot kind of processed and sitting there in front of you. So the ranked choice tabulations are going to happen August 31st. We should know the winner that day. But yeah, it'll be another quasi-election night in Alaska to wait up for. Alaska is so interesting. It's like it's got everything. Yeah.

All right. So we will be back on the podcast with those final results when we do get them at the end of the month. But let's leave it there for today. Thank you, Kaylee, Jeff, and Nathaniel. Thanks, guys. Thanks, Kaylin. Thank you, Kaylin.

My name is Galen Druk. Nash Consing is in the control room and on video editing today. Chadwick Matlin is our editorial director and Emily Vanesky is our intern and is also on audio editing today. You can get in touch by emailing us at podcasts at 538.com. You can also, of course, tweet at us with any questions or comments. If you're a fan of the show, leave us a rating or review in the Apple podcast store or tell someone about us. Thanks for listening and we will see you soon.

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