Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan has won reelection in Alaska, giving Republicans 50 seats in the Senate and leaving the balance of power in the chamber to be decided in a pair of January runoff elections in Georgia.
The Associated Press called the race for Sullivan more than a week after Election Day after votes trickled in from remote areas of the vast state. Sullivan defeated Al Gross, a surgeon and first-time candidate who raised significant money with the help of national Democrats who hoped a blue wave could help flip the state and the Senate.
That wave never materialized, and the path for Democratic control in the Senate has narrowed significantly. Republican fended off challenges in hotly contested seats in Maine, South Carolina, North Carolina, Iowa and Montana and picked up a seat in Alabama where Tommy Tuberville defeated incumbent Democrat Doug Jones. In North Carolina, the AP has not called the race, but Democratic candidate Cal Cunningham conceded to GOP Sen. Thom Tillis on Tuesday.
Gross, like many other Democrats this cycle, ran with significant financial resources from across the country. But that cash could not outrun Sullivan’s record in the state and GOP attempts to cast Gross as far-left liberal.
The energy and focus for both parties had already shifted go Georgia well before the race was called in Alaska. The heated battle over those seats has become entwined with President Trump’s ongoing battle to contest the outcome of the election despite increasing margins of victory for President-elect Joe Biden in both Georgia and Pennsylvania.
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