Wes Keller among incumbents who lost in Tuesday's primary

According to unofficial results from Tuesday’s primary, the Upper Valley will have a new representative in Juneau when the next session gavels in.

With all precincts reporting, David Eastman has a lead of thirteen percentage points and 214 votes over incumbent Wes Keller. Both candidates are Republicans living in Wasilla, and both are running for the District 10 seat in the Alaska House of Representatives.

Eastman carried a significant fundraising lead into Tuesday’s primary, and used his funds to attack Keller’s record in Juneau. Among his more common claims is his belief that Keller has voted for nine budgets that Eastman calls unsustainable. Eastman also ran a radio ad in the Valley accusing Keller of flip-flopping on term limits for state legislators.

Eastman won nine of District 10’s precincts. Keller’s victories came in Houston and Willow. Keller also took more early absentee votes than Eastman. The other two Republican candidates, Andrew Wright and Steve Menard, combined for about twenty percent of the Republican primary voters in District 10.

Eastman will face Democrat Christian Hartley of Houston in the general election this November. Hartley was unopposed in his party’s primary.

Keller was not the only incumbent casualty of this year’s primary. He isn’t even the only Valley incumbent to lose a primary challenge. Representative Jim Colver, District 9’s incumbent, was defeated after the Republican Party backed his opponent, Jim Rauscher. Colver was part of the small “Musk Ox Coalition,” a group of moderate Republicans that formed amid the budget negotiations of the last two years.

Statewide, voter turnout for Tuesday’s election was low, about 15.4%. In District 10, voter turnout was only slightly higher.