Inside Elections

Former Rep. Mary Peltola announced her Senate campaign on Monday, making Alaska a competitive race and giving Democrats a better chance at winning the majority in November. 

Getting Peltola into the race was a months-long effort for Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer considering the former congresswoman probably had a better chance of getting elected governor of the Last Frontier. But instead, she chose to challenge GOP Dan Sullivan in one of the most important Senate races in the country.

Inside Elections is changing the rating of the Alaska Senate race from Solid Republican to Lean Republican. 

Despite her statewide victory in 2022, Peltola will start the race as an underdog. Alaska is still a Republican state, where the GOP has a 9.4-point Baseline advantage and where President Donald Trump finished ahead of Vice President Kamala Harris by 13 points. And Democrats have only won one Senate election in 50 years. That was Mark Begich in 2008, against a scandal-tarred Sen. Ted Stevens, and he lost to Sullivan six years later. But Peltola overperformed in her 2024 re-election loss and the national political environment could help push her over the top. Republicans will have to take the race seriously.

Peltola’s candidacy makes Democrats’ narrow path to gaining four seats a little wider. But each step along the path to the majority is still difficult.

North Carolina looks like the easiest win for Democrats with the political environment and open seat, and yet the…