Election — Susie McCartney votes on Tuesday, Nov. 3 at the ANB/ANS Hall. The voting precinct was bustling most of the morning and stayed busy, according to election volunteers.
Similar to statewide trends, Haines voters favored Donald Trump on election day, but it’s unclear where Haines, or the state, will end up on the final tally because the counting of absentee and a portion of early ballots won’t begin until Nov. 10. Preliminary results were released by the Alaska Division of Elections Wednesday morning.
Haines Borough clerk Alekka Fullerton said 414 residents voted early. Early votes cast on or before Oct. 29 were counted on election day. Media outlets have reported that registered Democrats in Alaska were disproportionately represented in early and absentee voting. It’s unclear how many absentee votes were cast in Haines. The state doesn’t keep absentee voting numbers at the precinct level.
According to a precinct breakdown, 803 people in the Chilkat Valley cast ballots in-person on election day. These voters favored Republican incumbents President Donald Trump, U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan and U.S. Rep. Don Young by a roughly 20% margin, except in the Klukwan precinct, which heavily favored Democratic candidates.
In 2016, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton carried Haines by four votes.
Chilkat Valley voters on election day said “no” to Ballot Measure 1, which proposes changing the oil and gas tax structure for certain North Slope fields, and bucking the statewide trend on election day, said “yes” to Ballot Measure 2, which proposes changes to the state election process including ranked choice voting. Statewide, Ballot Measure 1 is down by roughly 53,000 votes. Ballot Measure 2 is closer, with “no” votes leading by a margin of roughly 25,000.
Voter turnout on Tuesday was 31% in precinct Haines 1 (town), 35% in Haines 2 (upper valley) and 45% in Klukwan. Voter turnout statewide was 30% on election day, although these percentages will likely increase as the state begins counting absentee and remaining early votes, which make up at least 41% of all ballots cast this election. Fullerton said, excluding absentee votes, in Haines, the minimum voter participation for the election was 49%.
Over all, House District 33 voters, which includes Juneau, Skagway and Haines, supported Biden on election day 3,037-1,765, as well as Democratic nominee Al Gross for Senate, Democratic nominee Alyse Galvin for the House and both ballot measures. In District 33, 2,071 people cast early voting ballots. District voters sent at least 3,275 by mail. The state will continue to accept ballots postmarked by election day until Nov. 13, or Nov. 18 for overseas voters.
Election day was a good day for Republican candidates across the state. As of Wednesday morning, Trump, Sullivan and Young led their respective challengers by roughly 30% margins. In State House and Senate races, Republican challengers were winning in a number of seats currently held by Democrats.
Fullerton said she wanted to dispel rumors on Facebook that votes in Haines were rejected due to using felt-tip pens. She said when a ballot is cast in the optical scan machine, the vote is counted immediately. If the machine could not read the vote, it would have rejected the ballot and a voter would be able to cast a new ballot.
“If the machine accepted your ballot, it was counted,” Fullerton said.
She said the state bought new optical scan machines and trials indicated the machines had difficulty reading ballots because the ball-point pen ink smeared. The division of elections tested new pens which worked, and were used locally.
The breakdown of federal and state election results by local precinct is as follows:
Haines No. 1
Registered Voters: 2,113
Votes cast: 656
President: 260 for Joe Biden, six for Don Blankenship, seven for James Jason, 11 for Jo Jorgensen, two for Brock Pierce and 363 for Donald Trump.
U.S. Senator: 252 for Al Gross, 25 for John Howe and 372 for Dan Sullivan.
U.S. Representative: 268 for Alyse Galvin, 374 for Don Young.
House District 33: 401 for Sara Hannan.
Ballot Measure No. 1: 296 yes, 338 no.
Ballot Measure No. 2: 337 yes, 305 no.
Haines No. 2
Registered Voters: 309
Votes cast: 110
President: 48 for Joe Biden, one for Jo Jorgensen, two for Brock Pierce and 363 for Donald Trump.
U.S. Senator: 48 for Al Gross, four for John Howe and 57 for Dan Sullivan.
U.S. Representative: 54 for Alyse Galvin and 55 for Don Young.
House District 33: 63 for Sara Hannan.
Ballot Measure No. 1: 45 yes, 62 no.
Ballot Measure No. 2: 61 yes, 44 no.
Klukwan:
Registered Voters: 82
Votes cast: 37
President: 28 for Joe Biden and five for Donald Trump.
U.S. Senator: 27 for Al Gross, six for John Howe and two for Dan Sullivan.
U.S. Representative: 28 for Alyse Galvin, nine for Don Young.
House District 33: 33 for Sara Hannan.
Ballot Measure No. 1: 22 yes, 15 no.
Ballot Measure No. 2: 28 yes, 9 no.