Sarah Palin will make her first run for public office in more than a decade on Tuesday. She enters the race for a seat in the United States House of Representatives representing Alaska’s at-large congressional district.
Palin’s victory is far from assured, despite the fact she has the backing of now-former President Donald Trump and strong name recognition in Alaska.
Liz Cheney and Sarah Palin represent important pieces of the Republican Party’s past. Tuesday’s elections will determine if they have a spot in the party’s next chapter.https://t.co/HT6a9shnUm
— POLITICO (@politico) August 16, 2022
In 2008, Palin made an unsuccessful bid for the position of vice president as the running mate of the late Senator John McCain. The following year, Palin resigned as governor before completing her single term in office.
New Voting System
Palin entered the contest for Alaska’s single House seat with the endorsement of President Trump in a so-called jungle primary. It drew scores of candidates shortly after the death of Alaska’s longstanding Republican Representative Don Young earlier this year.
Young was in office for about half of Alaska’s entire history as a state, which is the equivalent of nearly five decades.
The candidacy is not merely a test case for Palin, but also for Alaska’s new ranked-choice voting process, which permits four candidates to progress from a primary election.
In the initial elections held under the new structure, voters were asked to rank contenders in the order of their choice, rather than just selecting one candidate to vote for.
The candidates that finished in last place are removed from consideration; the votes cast by their voters for their subsequent choice are added to the total for that option.
The procedure continues for as many rounds as are necessary until a single contender exceeds the required threshold of 50 percent, plus one vote, and is deemed to be the victor.
A Republican businessman named Nick Begich III and a Democrat named Mary Peltola are both running in the special election. Shortly after the results were announced, independent candidate Al Gross, who also emerged from the primary, said he would quit.
Polling
Even though Palin finished first in the primary, polling conducted in late July indicated she would have a difficult time making it to Congress.
The field of candidates has been cut down to three. A survey conducted by Alaska Survey Research indicated Palin is falling behind her opponents as the first choice of voters.
Peltola received 41% of the vote, while Begich received 30%, and Palin received 29%. However, now that there are just two candidates left in the race, Begich has a lead over Peltola, while Palin is at the back of the pack.
As a result of her abrupt resignation as governor of Alaska, in what was widely interpreted as an effort to retain her national image and political stardom, Palin has abysmal popularity ratings in the state of Alaska.
After leaving the government, Palin became the subject of a reality television show that aired for a limited time and focused on her life in Alaska.
Former GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin slammed Alaska's new ranked choice voting system less than two weeks before running in a special election for the state's only House seat.https://t.co/sbSe6ouPAf
— Newsmax (@newsmax) August 5, 2022
Palin is running in both the primary for a two-year tenure that will begin in January and the special election to fill out Young’s term.
Because of the manner that absentee ballots are counted in Alaska’s elections, probably, the results of the election will not be known for many weeks.
This article appeared in The Record Daily and has been published here with permission.
