Alaska Republican Senate nominee Joe Miller appeared today on Fox News with Neil Cavuto, and brushed off concern that his legal maneuvering to try to stop the apparent victory of incumbent GOP Senator and write-in candidate Lisa Murkowski would damage the state, by depriving it of a second Senator. Furthermore, he seemed to say that Alaska having a full complement of senators would only further the “fiscal destruction of the nation” if the other senator is Murkowski.
Cavuto asked about comments today from Alaska’s Democratic Sen. Mark Begich, who called upon Miller to concede and not hold up the certification of Murkowski’s win: “I’m sorry, but are you concerned, as Sen. Begich pointed out, that whatever your reasons — and they might be perfectly justified — Alaska stands a pretty good likelihood now of having just one senator for a while, when some of the biggest issues of our time are being debated.”
“Yeah, and I guess the question becomes, is that one extra vote gonna be used to continue to grow government, continue the largesse, to continue earmarks — to basically continue the fiscal destruction of the nation?” Miller responded. “And frankly, I don’t think we need that.
“But you know, getting more to the point, I don’t think anybody’s actually proven there’s gonna be adverse impact. Hopefully, this process can be resolved quickly, and before, you know, the January swearing-in date.”
Miller won the Republican primary in August in a stunning 51%-49% upset, aided by the support of Tea Party activists and former Gov. Sarah Palin. However, Murkowski rebounded with a write-in campaign, which seems to have overcome all the obstacles that such an effort would face.
Write-in votes for Murkowski, counting those that were challenged by Miller’s campaign but nevertheless accepted by the state, give her a lead of 10,328 votes. Even after subtracting every single write-in ballot that Team Miller has challenged, Murkowski still leads by 2,169.
Miller has filed a lawsuit to try to block Murkowski’s apparent win in the race, charging that various write-in ballots for Murkowski should be thrown out on the basis of alleged write-in errors — though even the ballots he has challenged would not close the current gap. He is also urging for a statewide recount that might make up the rest. A state judge has expedited the case, with arguments set for this Wednesday.
Eric Kleefeld
Eric Kleefeld joined TPM as an intern for the final months of the 2006 midterm elections, and then kept showing up for work. His other interests include guitars, old comic books and the politics of various English-speaking countries.
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