Why Alaska and Mississippi Senate results could take days, even weeks

Key Points:

• The Mississippi and Alaska Senate races remain too close to call, with results potentially delayed for days or weeks due to ongoing ballot counts and Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system.
• Democrats and their allied Independents currently hold 54 Senate seats, and these two tight races will determine the size of their incoming majority, while Republicans aim to prevent further Democratic gains.
• In Mississippi, Democrat Scott Colom leads Republican incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith by fewer than 100 votes amid nearly 950,000 counted ballots, with mail-in and provisional ballots still to be processed over the next five days.
• Alaska’s race between Democrat Mary Peltola and Republican Dan Sullivan is similarly tight, with Peltola leading by fewer than 1,000 votes and about 74% of votes counted; military and remote-area ballots may arrive up to 15 days post-Election Day.
• If no candidate in Alaska surpasses 50%, the ranked-choice voting tally will begin on November 18, potentially delaying final results until mid to late November.