Early results show voters leaning against recall of Midtown Anchorage Assembly member Meg Zaletel - Anchorage Daily News

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Anchorage Assembly member Meg Zaletel, right, listens to Assembly Chair Suzanne LaFrance speak during the Anchorage Assembly meeting on Tuesday, July 13, 2021. (Bill Roth / ADN)

Preliminary special election results show Midtown voters are so far rejecting an effort to recall Anchorage Assembly member Meg Zaletel.

Still, more ballots remain to be counted. Just 9,346 ballots were included in the preliminary election results posted on Tuesday evening. That’s about 22% of the total registered voters in the district.

So far, 61.2% of District 4 voters have voted no on Zaletel’s recall while 38.8% have voted yes. The percentages will likely change in the coming days as more ballots are tallied. Updated results will be posted on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays as counting continues, the city clerk’s office said.

More than 9,500 ballot envelopes had been returned to the election center by 6 p.m. Tuesday. As voting closed at 8 p.m., election workers gathered the last of the ballots that voters had placed in drop boxes and the ballots cast in person at the Anchorage Vote Center in the Loussac Library.

None of the ballots cast on election day were included in Tuesday night’s initial election results.

More ballots will continue to arrive by mail. Most ballots postmarked by Oct. 26 have until Nov. 8 to make it to the elections center and be counted. Military and overseas ballots have until noon on Nov. 9 to arrive and be counted.

With so few votes counted, it remains unclear whether the vote will swing out of Zaletel’s favor.

[Recall vote of Assembly member Meg Zaletel viewed as a proxy battle over the future of Anchorage politics]

The vote comes more than a year after the recall petition against Zaletel was initially filed and after a state Supreme Court fight over whether it could proceed.

It is also nearly identical to a recall initiative against Midtown Assembly member Felix Rivera that voters rejected in April.

A voter casts her ballot at a secure ballot drop box outside the Loussac Library on Monday afternoon, Oct. 25, 2021. Midtown voters will decide whether or not to recall Anchorage Assembly member Meg Zaletel during a special election on Tuesday. (Bill Roth / ADN)

The official stated reason for recall is that Zaletel participated in an Assembly meeting that may have had too many people present under a COVID-19 emergency order last year. But campaigners say the vote is really a battle over policy disagreements and the direction of politics in Anchorage.

Zaletel has largely supported the city’s current and previous COVID-19 restrictions, and many of the recall’s proponents have opposed such restrictions. Zaletel supported other issues last year that some residents have vehemently opposed, such as a controversial plan to purchase buildings for homeless and treatment services using CARES Act funds.

Both sides of the recall effort have poured tens of thousands of dollars into the special election.

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Early results show voters leaning against recall of Midtown Anchorage Assembly member Meg Zaletel - Anchorage Daily News
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