If Iowa and New Hampshire aren’t enough to shake out the Republican presidential field, Alaska will sit among the deciding states.
Eleven candidates have registered for the Presidential Preference Poll, according to announcements from the Alaska Republican Party. The March 1 poll takes place alongside the polls, primaries and caucuses of 12 other states across the nation on that date.
The 11 candidates: Jeb Bush, Ben Carson, Chris Christie, Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, Mike Huckabee, John Kasich, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Rick Santorum and Donald Trump. On Monday, Huckabee announced that he is suspending his campaign. That would leave 10 candidates for the March 1 poll, assuming no others withdraw.
Alaska awards its delegates to the national Republican convention proportionally, based upon the percentage of the vote each candidate receives. At the national Republican convention July 21 in Cleveland, Ohio, a candidate must receive a majority from 2,472 total delegates to become the party’s nominee. Alaska has 25 delegates that will be bound by the results of the March 1 poll.
According to a poll commissioned by the Alaska Dispatch News before the Iowa caucuses, 27.9 percent of registered Alaska Republican voters favor Donald Trump as the GOP choice for president. Ted Cruz was the No. 2 pick in the poll, with 23.8 percent of registered Republican respondents favoring the U.S. Senator from Texas.
