Following yesterday's counting of early and absentee ballots by the Division of Elections, we hold a 814 vote lead over Ted Stevens.

Heather Rauch, Campaign Manager, sent this email to supporters this morning:

Today, Begich campaign staff around the state monitored Division of Election (DOE) sites as the first 50,000 early and absentee ballots were counted. This evening the DOE is reporting that we have closed the gap between Mark and Ted Stevens and now lead by 814 votes - a 4000 swing in one day! We're excited about the latest count, but know with 40,000 absentee and question ballots out, we still have a lot of work to do to ensure every vote is counted.

Mark released this statement on these preliminary results:

"I've always said that this would be a close race. After watching the votes today, I remain cautiously optimistic. As I have said before, we ran an aggressive campaign, especially when it came to early voting and absentee. From what we're seeing, thousands of Alaskans, like me, did come out and vote early. I'm confident that Alaskans, like the rest of the country, want a new direction in Washington, and ultimately that will be reflected in the results."

Mark will be appearing on The Ed Schultz Show at 8:30am AKST (9:30am PST, 12:30pm EST) Thursday and The Rachel Maddow's Show on MSNBC Thursday to discuss the campaign. Make sure to tune in!

The Division of Elections will continue to count the 40,000 remaining ballots starting Friday and going into early next week. All ballots must be counted by November 19th and the DOE plans to certify the election on Tuesday, November 25th.

In the end we expect that this will be a very close race and there will be a recount. We are starting to prepare for this scenario, and will really need your support to make sure every vote is counted fairly.

We will keep fighting to win this election and send new leadership to Washington that will move Alaska, and this country, forward.

Thank you,

Heather Rauch
Campaign Manager
Alaskans for Begich