Preliminary Anchorage election results Thursday show Weddleton losing to Sulte by a greater margin

South Anchorage Assembly incumbent John Weddleton lost more ground to challenger Randy Sulte while all other Assembly and school board incumbents continued to defeat challenges from the right in the latest round of preliminary Anchorage city election results posted Thursday.

Sulte widened his lead to 577 votes with just over 51% of the vote in a competitive race for the two-term Assembly member’s seat, leaving little chance that Weddleton could win a third term.

Weddleton on Thursday called his chances “a long shot” and said he’s proud of the work he has done while representing South Anchorage. While he said he is not yet conceding, he also said the numbers are “pretty clear.”

“Being on the Assembly has been absolutely amazing. It’s certainly been challenging with the pandemic and recession and the earthquake and all those things,” Weddleton said. “But we’ve done amazing stuff, and it’s just such a thrill to have been there for it. So I carry that with me and when I look back, I think I did good work.”

Sulte said he is waiting for the election results to be certified before declaring victory.

Still, he said, “I’m just humbled that people are going to give me a chance to try to help the city and do what I can.”

Other than the South Anchorage race, ballots have broken overwhelmingly in favor of the incumbents in the Anchorage municipal election. As election officials continue to count ballots, all but Weddleton have steadily held leads over a group of conservative challengers favored by Mayor Dave Bronson, who have coordinated efforts to unseat the moderate-to-liberal-leaning incumbents.

As that trend continues, the preliminary results signify that the Assembly majority will likely retain enough members to override the mayor’s vetoes. However, candidates have yet to declare victory or concede losses in the races as they wait for election workers to count more ballots.

Two bond proposals were still failing by small margins, including a major proposition to upgrade school district buildings. All others were passing.

By Thursday, elections officials had counted 54,787 ballots, representing about 23% of registered voters. The latest results included 8,606 additional ballots.

Election officials say they have received more than 68,400 ballots at the election center. That doesn’t include ballots cast in-person at vote centers on election day, or ballots from two drop boxes on Tuesday, while more are still arriving by mail.

West Anchorage Assembly incumbent Kameron Perez-Verdia had a 13-point lead over challenger Liz Vazquez with 54% of the vote. In East Anchorage, Forrest Dunbar had a 14-point lead over Stephanie Taylor, his most competitive challenger, with 56% of the vote.

Midtown Assembly incumbent Meg Zaletel was besting Kathy Henslee with a nearly 6-point lead and 53% of the vote.

School board incumbents Margo Bellamy and Kelly Lessens continued to beat two Bronson-backed conservative candidates by margins that are near-impossible to overcome.

Eagle River/Chugiak Assembly candidate Kevin Cross is winning the race to replace outgoing Assembly member Crystal Kennedy, who did not run for reelection.

Political observers and incumbents have said that the early results show many voters — especially those outside of the city’s two most conservative districts — are rejecting messaging from Bronson and the challengers that emphatically criticized Assembly incumbents.

Preliminary results - Assembly

District 2 - Seat A - Eagle River/Chugiak

Kevin Cross - 60%, 4,825 votes; Gretchen Wehmhoff - 35%, 2,778 votes; Vanessa Stephens - 5%, 402 votes

District 3 - Seat D - West Anchorage

Kameron Perez-Verdia (incumbent) - 54%, 5,216 votes; Liz Vazquez - 41%, 4,034 votes; Nial Sherwood Williams 5%, 486 votes

District 4 - Seat F - Midtown

Meg Zaletel (incumbent) 53%, 4,727 votes; Kathy Henslee 47%, 4,214 votes

District 5 - Seat H - East Anchorage

Forrest Dunbar (incumbent) - 56%, 5,268 votes; Stephanie Taylor - 42%, 3,944 votes; Christopher Hall - 3%, 252 votes

District 6 - Seat J - South Anchorage

Randy Sulte - 51%, 7,405 votes; John Weddleton (incumbent) - 47%, 6,828 votes; Darin Colbry - 2%, 238 votes

Preliminary results - School Board

Seat A

Margo Bellamy (incumbent) - 49%, 25,066 votes; Mark Anthony Cox - 40%, 20,224 votes; Dan Loring - 3%,1,630 votes

(Cliff Murray - 8%, 3,831 votes; Murray announced his withdrawal from the race but was included on the ballot.)

Seat B

Kelly Lessens (incumbent) - 50%, 25,699 votes; Rachel Ries - 41%, 21,096 votes; Dustin Darden - 5%, 2,411 votes

(Benjamin Baldwin - 3%, 1,736 votes; Baldwin announced his withdrawal from the race but was included on the ballot.)