Democrat Mary Peltola beats Sarah Palin in Alaska special election

Mary Peltola.
(Image credit: Ash Adams for The Washington Post via Getty Image)

In a major upset, Democrat Mary Peltola defeated Republican Sarah Palin in August's special election for the U.S. House seat in Alaska, according to final results released Wednesday.

Alaska is now using a ranked-choice voting system, and while the election was held on Aug. 16, the second-choice counts weren't made until Wednesday. Peltola held a 9-point lead over Palin, the former governor of Alaska and 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee, in first-preference votes. She won the second round with 52 percent of the vote compared to Palin's 49 percent, Axios reports.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.