Republican presidential hopeful Ted Cruz won a narrow victory over opponent Donald Trump in Alaska on Tuesday.
During the Presidential Preference Poll, Alaska’s Republican caucus, Alaskans favored Cruz and Trump by a wide margin, with Marco Rubio trailing by about 18 percent. Cruz won 36.4 percent of the vote; Trump won 33.5 percent, and Rubio won 15.1 percent, according to the Alaska GOP’s final count.
The other two candidates still on the ballot, Ben Carson and John Kasich, won nearly 11 percent and 4.1 percent respectively. However, neither won enough of the vote to receive delegates from the state at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland in July. Candidates had to receive at least 13 percent of the vote in the primary to receive delegates, according to the Alaska GOP.
The designated delegates will be divided among the top three candidates. Cruz will take 12, Trump will take 11 and Rubio will take five, for a total of 28 delegates.
The turnout was exceptionally high, breaking a record, according to a Wednesday update from the Alaska GOP. Nearly 22,000 Republicans turned out to vote in Alaska, not counting out-of-district voters. That is 57 percent more voters than turned out in 2012 and approximately double the turnout of 2008, according to the Alaska GOP.
— Elizabeth Earl
