Valley, Alaska Republicans narrowly pick Cruz over Trump

WASILLA — Mat-Su Republicans narrowly favored Texas Sen. Ted Cruz over New York businessman Donald Trump in the party’s presidential primary voting Tuesday.

According to results released by the Alaska Republican Party, Cruz earned support from 38.7 percent of Valley voters, compared to 36.9 percent for Trump. Both of those figures were similar to statewide figures, which gave the edge to Cruz (36.4 percent) by about three percent over Trump (33.5 percent).

Trump won three of the five Mat-Su areas, garnering the most support in the Knik-Goose Bay area, where he picked up 43.9 percent of the vote. Trump also took the top spot in Wasilla (38.6), and the Northwest Mat-Su (43.6). However, Cruz dominated in Palmer, where he received 43.8 percent of the vote compared to Trump’s 30.4 percent, as well as the Eastern Mat-Su, where he defeated Trump by more than nine percentage points.

Neurologist Ben Carson earned 11.9 percent of the vote in the Mat-Su to take third in the area, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio got 10.4 percent and Ohio Gov. John Kasich got 2.1 percent.

Statewide, Rubio was third with 15.1 percent, Carson placed fourth at 10.9 percent and Kasich was fifth with 4.1 percent.

Alaska awards its delegates to the national Republican convention on a proportional basis, meaning Cruz will receive 12 delegates, Trump gets 11 and Rubio earns five.

According to the Associated Press, Trump now has 319 delegates, followed by Cruz with 226, Rubio with 110, Kasich with 25 and Carson with eight. A total of 1,236 delegates are needed to win the Republican nomination.