Miller Waiting Out the Alaska Senate Race

Joe Miller is showing no signs of giving up his fight for the Alaska Senate seat.  Appearing on Fox & Friends Friday morning, the Tea Party-backed Republican candidate was confident despite being down by about six percentage points to the incumbent write-in candidate, Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, claiming that there are approximate 31,000 absentee ballots still being counted as well as a review of the 81,000 write-in votes.  Democratic nominee Scott McAdams has already conceded the race.

Murkowski declared victory Wednesday by tweeting, “Thank you Alaska. It is clear that we made history together last night by putting Alaska first!”

Miller pointed out that in the past the reviewing of ballots has made a significant difference, "the last write-in campaign was Robin Taylor's bid for governor in 1998, and approximately 7.8 percent of those ballets were disqualified.  We assume that the same standard will be applied by the division of elections in this election."

A former Army officer, Miller is also keenly aware that many of the absentee ballots are likely to have a high concentration of military personnel.

Only one senator has ever been elected by a write-in vote and that was South Carolina Democratic Senator Strom Thurmond in 1954.Miller remained confident, "We are looking optimistically, cautiously to the future."