Friday's vote count ended with Mark Begich in the lead by 1022 votes over Ted Stevens. The final rounds of vote counting will occur on Monday and Tuesday and Begich has a great chance at forcing Stevens to pay the $15,000 fee required to start a recount.
Below the fold is my extrapolation of what this week's count will bring.
The outstanding ballots that remain will be counted as follows:
• Region I, Juneau – will count all remaining questioned ballots on Friday, November 14th
at 1:00pm and all remaining absentee ballots on Tuesday, November 18th at 9:00am.
• Region II, Anchorage – will count all remaining absentee and questioned ballots on
Tuesday, November 18th at 10:00am.
• Region II, Wasilla – will count all remaining questioned ballots at 8:00am and remaining absentee ballots at 1:00pm on Friday, November 14th.
• Region III, Fairbanks – will count all remaining questioned ballots and possibly some of the remaining absentee ballots on Friday, November 14th at 11:00am. Any absentee ballots that do not get counted on November 14th will be counted on Monday, November 17th at 10:00am.
• Region IV, Nome – will count all remaining absentee and questioned ballots on Friday, November 14th at 8:00am.
There are only 24,079 Ballots left to count, 8370 of which are scheduled for Monday, with the remaining 15,709 set to be counted on Tuesday.
District | Absentee | Question | B % Abs | B % Que | S % Abs | S % Que | Proj. Begich | Proj. Stevens |
1 | 506 | 0 | 15.43% | N/A | 76.57% | N/A | 78 | 387 |
2 | 2116 | 0 | 52.82% | N/A | 35.90% | N/A | 1118 | 760 |
3 | 138 | 0 | 73.71% | N/A | 22.29% | N/A | 102 | 31 |
4 | 140 | 0 | 61.56% | N/A | 33.80% | N/A | 86 | 47 |
5 | 1839 | 0 | 52.78% | N/A | 37.96% | N/A | 971 | 698 |
33 | 692 | 0 | 42.48% | N/A | 47.66% | N/A | 294 | 330 |
34 | 1093 | 0 | 35.45% | N/A | 53.54% | N/A | 387 | 585 |
35 | 959 | 0 | 59.09% | N/A | 36.72% | N/A | 567 | 352 |
36 | 508 | 0 | 44.42% | N/A | 44.65% | N/A | 226 | 227 |
Mon. Sub. | | 7991 | | 47.90% | | 42.76% | 3828 | 3417 |
Mon. Total | | 301336 | | 47.38% | | 46.91% | 142787 | 141354 |
17 | 586 | 461 | 40.62% | 40.22% | 54.14% | 54.79% | 386 | 466 |
18 | 519 | 582 | 45.45% | 48.57% | 44.83% | 43.21% | 462 | 459 |
19 | 360 | 551 | 58.91% | 50.95% | 36.60% | 44.43% | 437 | 356 |
20 | 388 | 503 | 62.24% | 55.34% | 34.34% | 40.63% | 464 | 356 |
21 | 430 | 467 | 58.27% | 51.13% | 38.01% | 45.35% | 442 | 354 |
22 | 579 | 369 | 64.91% | 58.09% | 30.43% | 37.68% | 547 | 348 |
23 | 556 | 504 | 65.41% | 60.95% | 31.02% | 35.42% | 609 | 418 |
24 | 513 | 690 | 57.94% | 50.62% | 37.28% | 45.27% | 577 | 471 |
25 | 451 | 567 | 63.47% | 55.47% | 33.57% | 40.44% | 538 | 403 |
26 | 470 | 482 | 60.47% | 54.03% | 36.35% | 42.94% | 493 | 379 |
27 | 426 | 496 | 49.06% | 44.22% | 48.16% | 51.81% | 384 | 381 |
28 | 503 | 409 | 48.48% | 42.85% | 47.49% | 53.16% | 384 | 379 |
29 | 430 | 554 | 53.23% | 48.36% | 43.54% | 47.87% | 443 | 402 |
30 | 419 | 599 | 52.44% | 46.34% | 43.94% | 50.06% | 442 | 406 |
31 | 443 | 376 | 45.31% | 41.62% | 49.97% | 54.89% | 326 | 347 |
32 | 640 | 386 | 49.75% | 46.33% | 46.99% | 50.30% | 461 | 444 |
Tues Sub. | | 7713 | | 53.59% | | 46.14% | 7395 | 6368 |
Current | | 293345 | | 47.37% | | 47.02% | 138959 | 137937 |
Total | | 310707 | | 47.58% | | 46.92% | 147828 | 145799 |
Methodology:
Uncounted vote totals were taken directly from the latest data available at the Alaska Elections Division Website.
"B % Abs" and S % Abs are the allocated absentee vote percentages for Begich and Stevens respectively. These absentee vote projection ware calculated by awarding the votes available to each candidate in proportion to the votes received per District during the previous Absentee Ballot counts.
"B % Que" and "S % Que" are the allocated "Questioned" (provisional) vote percentages for Begich and Stevens respectively. These Questioned vote projection ware calculated by awarding 80% of the votes available to each candidate in proportion to the votes received per District during the election.
The Alaska recount laws call for an automatic recount only in case of a tie. The candidate or any group of ten or more voters can ask for a recount. If the certified differential on Nov. 19th is greater than 0.5% (~1550 votes), the group requesting the recount must pay a $15,000 fee for the recount.
This race will almost certainly result in a recount, I actually want Stephens to stay within the 0.5% margin and ask the people of Alaska to pay for the recount to help a convicted felon, who will probably be thrown out of the Senate before the recount is completed. "Ain't I a stinker."