Two U.S. Senate races remained uncalled on Thursday, with Democrat Scott Colom leading Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith by 1,138 votes in Mississippi and Democrat Mary Peltola narrowly ahead of Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan in Alaska, leaving the final shape of the Senate unsettled a day after Democrats swept to control of both chambers of Congress.
In Mississippi, the latest Associated Press tally gave Colom 464,926 votes to 463,788 for Hyde-Smith, with each candidate at about 49 percent of the vote in one of the closest Senate contests of the midterm elections. Independent candidate Ty Pinkins took 19,934 votes. With 99.83 percent of precincts reporting, roughly 3,600 mail-in ballots are still to be tallied, along with an unknown number of affidavit ballots cast by voters whose eligibility needed checking. Counties must submit certified results by November 13, and mail ballots sent by Election Day can still be counted if they arrive within five business days, so the race is not expected to be called before at least November 10.
Mississippi has no automatic recount provision — the only state without one for a race like this — and a candidate cannot simply request a recount. Any recount would require a court order. A Colom victory would make him the first Black senator elected from Mississippi since Reconstruction, and it would flip a seat in one of the most reliably Republican states in the country.
In Alaska, Peltola leads Sullivan by 637 votes, with nearly a quarter of the vote still uncounted. Because neither candidate cleared 50 percent, the winner will be decided by ranked-choice tabulation, which will not take place until November 18, with certification set for November 25. The race drew national attention after reports that aides to Peltola had recruited a second candidate named Dan Sullivan — a retired teacher from Petersburg — to run and siphon votes from the Republican incumbent. The namesake candidate drew about 3,500 votes, more than the margin separating the front-runners. A federal judge dismissed a Justice Department suit seeking to set aside his ballots, ruling it lacked a legal foundation; the department has said it will appeal. Peltola has denied any knowledge of the alleged plot.
Nationally, Democrats will start the 120th Congress on January 3 with at least 54 of the Senate's 100 seats. Victories in both remaining races would lift that majority to 56, giving the party a wider cushion for the next two years — but in Mississippi, the count could still move by thousands of votes, and in Alaska, the ranked-choice count is weeks away. For now, both seats hang in the balance.
