Sarah Palin advances to general election in Alaska congressional race Transcript

Diane: (00:00) In Alaska, Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski is projected to advance to the general election, along with the other three top vote getters in the Senate Primary there. Former governor and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin will also be among the top four candidates for Alaska's at large house district. ABC's Zohreen Shah joins me live now for more on this. Zohreen, Palin and her opponents are actually running two races at once. How does that work? Zohreen Shah: (00:26) Yeah, it's a little confusing, right, Diane? Good morning. So the first race is the special election and that's where former representative Don Young's seat. He passed away in March. And so the winner last night will finish his term until early next year. And then the winner coming up in November will serve the next two year term. Diane: (00:42) Now Palin is calling this ranked choice voting system crazy and convoluted, her words. How does it work? And when could we see a result here? Zohreen Shah: (00:52) It's definitely a little confusing. We will likely see, we will see results, I should say. They will be determined August 31st. This is how it works. So if a candidate gets over 50% of that vote, they win, outright, race is over. That did not happen last night, as you can see from your screen right there. So then the candidate with the least amount of votes, they get booted out. And then the ballots for that candidate, they get redistributed to the voter's second choice. And then it keeps going until you have two people who will then move on to November. Diane: (01:21) Senator Lisa Murkowski, meanwhile, survived a challenge from Trump backed Kelly Shabaka for now, but they have to face off again in the general election. How is that race shaping up? Zohreen Shah: (01:31) Yeah, she did. I mean, look, you saw John Carl's package on Liz Cheney, right? That was a landslide loss, I guess, for her in that race. Murkowski is going to likely very differently. So far she has 44% of the vote with 67% of the vote in. Shabaka second place right now with 40% of the vote. They're separated by just 5,000 votes. So it appears to be fairly close right now. But look, Murkowski voted to convict Trump. That's why we are talking about her right now. That's why it appears this race is so close. The Alaska system, their voting system likely saved her. The way it works for this race is at that top four, regardless of party, will move on to November. But remember, Shabaka is backed by Donald Trump. That November election could potentially be very tough for Murkowski. We've seen what happens when Trump backs people. Diane. Diane: (02:21) All right. Zohreen Shah, thank you. George Stephanopoulos: (02:24) Hi everyone, George Stephanopoulos here. Thanks for checking out the ABC news YouTube channel. If you'd like to get more videos, show highlights and watch live event coverage, click on the right over here to subscribe to our channel. And don't forget to download the ABC News app for breaking news alerts. Thanks for watching.