Trump critics tested in Alaska and Wyoming primaries

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• Judy Woodruff:

  Two Western states holding highly anticipated primary races today should give us yet another look at how much power former President Trump has on the Republican Party.

  Laura Barrón-López is following the elections in Wyoming and Alaska, and she joins me now.

  So, hello, Laura.

• Laura Barrón-López:

  Hello.

• Judy Woodruff:

  You know you have been on the road, most recently in Wyoming, just last week, looking at this Liz Cheney race.

  What does it look like for her there?

• Laura Barrón-López:

  So, Liz Cheney is likely to lose tonight because of the fact that that is what all the polling shows.

  So, if she somehow pulls off a miracle, then that would be a stunner for everyone, considering that Republicans outnumber Democrats in the state 4-1. And the Republicans that we spoke to in that state overwhelmingly oppose her. They support her — the front-runner right now, which is Harriet Hageman. She's a lawyer, and she ran for governor in 2018. And she has the endorsement of former President Donald Trump.

  And really the dividing line here is that Democratic voters are switching party lines to vote for Cheney because of her work on the January 6 Committee and because of the fact that they see her standing up for the truth and confronting Trump and his election lies. That's the very same reason that so many Republicans are voting against her.

  And the poll that I'm talking about is the University of Wyoming poll that shows that Cheney is down by some 29 points. Cheney is at 28 percent and Hageman is at 57 percent. So it's not looking good for her.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Even with the Democrats crossing over to change party.

• Laura Barrón-López:

  Right.

• Judy Woodruff:

  So I know you have been talking to a lot of analysts.

  If she were to lose, what are they telling you about what that would say about the Republican Party and Donald Trump?

• Laura Barrón-López:

  Well, it really would fit into a pattern, right, that we have seen every primary night, where a number of election deniers continue to win, the Republican nominee, whether it's up or down the ballot, secretary of state races, gubernatorial races, Senate races and House races.

  And, actually, The Washington Post had this recent investigation where they broke down the data, and it showed that, across battleground states, major battleground states, some 62 percent of the GOP nominees that won their primaries have denied the 2020 election results and said that Trump won.

  So, ultimately, what — even if Cheney were somehow to win, it really shows that former President Trump has a big grip on the party right now.

• Judy Woodruff:

  A formidable force.

  So, Laura, stay right here, but we do want to turn right now for a moment to Alaska, because, as we mentioned, two big raises there for the House and for the Senate that we're watching.

  Our colleague Amna Nawaz was in Alaska recently talking to voters. And here is some of what they told her about how polarized this election has become.

• Natasha Faulke, Alaska Voter:

  I mean, I have lived here my whole life. I have been a voter for 10 years. And it makes me nervous to see just such heightened representation of people's feelings for a candidate.

• Doug Campbell, Alaska Voter:

  When you get into a lot of this radical, hardcore partisan stuff, I just don't feel like it is good for the country or good for the average American or especially the average Alaskan.

• Judy Woodruff:

  So, Laura, I should say, we're — a bunch of voters were expressing their views.

  But let's talk about these races, starting with the Senate race, where Lisa Murkowski running for reelection, and she's hoping to move on to the general election, but she does face a strong Republican challenge. Tell us about that.

• Laura Barrón-López:

  She does.

  This is an all-party primary. So there's going to be some — a lot of names on the ballot. The top four move on. Lisa Murkowski has faced uphill battles before. Some of our viewers will remember that she had to be a write-in candidate previously, and she prevailed. But this is different, because, again, she is the only Republican senator out of the seven that voted to convict former President Trump who is actually facing reelection right now.

  And she again is up against a Trump-endorsed candidate. And this would be the fourth full term, if Murkowski were somehow to win. She again is pushing for moderate voters, independent voters to really come and rally behind her.

  And she's up against Kelly Tshibaka, a former commissioner of the state Department of Administration. And so, again, very similar to Cheney, Murkowski is someone who stood up to Trump, who decided that she was going to support the second impeachment and vote for conviction. And, again, she's she's pretty much being challenged by the former president and by a lot of Republicans who don't want to support her for that very reason.

• Judy Woodruff:

  And it has become an issue in that race.

  And, as we mentioned, the House race — only one House seat in Alaska — the House race involves the name we know from the past, and that's Sarah Palin. What does that race look like?

• Laura Barrón-López:

  Again, so there are two races right now. There is the special election race, which Palin is running in to replace former Congressman Don Young, who passed away in March.

  And she is up against a Republican, Nick Begich, who is of the well-known Begich family and Alaska. Former Senator Begich was — is a Democrat. And so he's related to him. And then, again, she's also up against a Democrat, Mary Peltola, who a lot of Republicans were concerned that Peltola, because this is in the special election ranked choice, that she could actually end up getting ahead of the two Republicans if they split the vote.

  Now, in addition to that, there is also a primary race that all of these candidates are running in as well. And that features some 22 names on the ballot again. And the top four are going to move on. And so Palin is expected to advance in that race to the November election, as well as the other two, most likely.

  So, right now, though, there isn't very good polling in this race in Alaska. So it's very difficult to say who could come in first or who will ultimately win in November.

• Judy Woodruff:

  And we should say this voting process requires voters to pay close attention to what they're doing as they do the ranked choice, make their decisions.

• Laura Barrón-López:

  Right.

• Judy Woodruff:

  Laura Barron-Lopez, we thank you.

• Laura Barrón-López:

  Thank you.

• Judy Woodruff:

  And on our Web site, we want to tell you can follow the live results from tonight's elections as they come in.

  That is at PBS.org/NewsHour. You will want to follow that.

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