Assembly races remain tight after election night

WASILLA — Voters in Mat-Su Borough Assembly District’s 4 and 5 voted on new assembly members on Tuesday, but as is the theme of elections in 2020, final results are yet to be determined.

In Assembly District 4 which covers Wasilla, Rob Yundt II holds a sizable lead over two opponents in the race for the assembly seat in District 4, currently represented by Ted Leonard.

“I grew up with humble beginnings and I’ve had to work my butt off my entire life for everything I’ve gotten and everybody in the Valley has got that attitude and nobody out here is asking for anything for free and I think we all just want to live a good peaceful life without a bunch of weird restrictions put on us and I think that shone through tonight,” said Yundt.

Yundt carries the largest lead of any borough candidate among the two available seats on the Mat-Su School Board and Assembly. Yundt received 1,819 votes, accounting for 61.08 percent of the 2,978 votes cast in the race for Assembly District 4. Planning Commission Chair Colleen Vague narrowly leads Amber Sanchez, with Vague receiving 595 votes accounting for nearly 20 percent of the votes and Sanchez receiving 564 votes accounting for 18.94 percent.

“This is a testament to the way we live our life in the Valley, right. What brought my grandparents here 70 years ago and their relatives here 100 years ago was opportunity. We have a lot of opportunity in the Mat-Su Valley. Can the assembly directly affect opening up some of them doors, we can with some of it but just perfecting our way of life out here and make sure we don’t turn into, I hate to say it I mean I’ve got a lot of family and friends in Anchorage, but they’ve gone sideways in there. They’ve turned into a mess,” said Yundt.

Assembly District 5 covers Big Lake and Point Mackenzie and is currently represented by Dan Mayfield, who ran for Senate against David Wilson. Mayfield defeated Clayton ‘Mokie’ Tew for the seat in 2017 by 18 votes, which sprung a recount at the time. Tew carries a 67-vote lead into Wednesday over three opponents.

“I’ve been here before,” said Tew. “Obviously I wish that it was over and I either won or didn’t win but I was here before where I was up.”

Tew received 1,160 votes accounting for 33.12 percent of the votes cast for Assembly District 5. Trailing Tew by less than two points is Lisa Behrens with 1,093 votes. Mike Alexander received 854 votes accounting for nearly 25 percent of the vote and Ken Koch received 395 votes.

Poll totals that were reported by the Mat-Su Borough on Tuesday are subject to change rapidly over the next two weeks as record numbers of absentee by mail ballots, early voting ballots and all other alternative forms of voting are tallied. As results came in Tuesday night, candidates that came out ahead were happy, but hesitant.

“I’m really looking forward to getting on the assembly. I know a few people already sitting up there, I know another one that’s about ready to be seated on there and I’m really looking forward to doing a lot of good work for my community and actually the whole Mat-Su Valley and I think I’m going to make a really good impact and a really positive move for our community,” said Tew.

With elections for only Assembly District’s 4 and 5 and Mat-Su School Board seats in District’s 3 and 6, 21 of 41 borough precincts voted on Tuesday. Absentee ballots postmarked by Nov. 3 and received by the Borough Clerk Lonnie McKechnie until Nov. 10 will be accepted and over 2,000 absentee ballots will be counted and tallied in the coming days.

“They go through and they canvass the absentee all at once and if we were to get additional ballots after they got done canvassing the absentee, we’d canvas the additional ballots. Then we’d move forward and we’d canvas the questioned ballots. We count everything at one time, we don’t count things at separate times. It’s all counted on one day,” said McKechnie.