Murkowski insider: Considering third-party run if Miller wins GOP nod

According to The Daily Beast, in an exclusive interview, a person inside Sen. Lisa Murkowski's re-election campaign said that if indeed Joe Miller ends up winning the Republican U.S. Senate nomination, the incumbent senator would have to decide whether or not to abandon the GOP and defend her seat on a third-party ticket. The insider confirmed that the campaign is seriously looking at an undisclosed option that would allow her to do that. One (difficult) option she has is to wage a write-in campaign, but electoral conditions placed on the circumstances that write-in ballots are counted make that option unlikely. The other option the Daily Beast mentions is to bail on the GOP and run as an Independent or on a third-party ticket, perhaps the Alaska Independence Party's. Veteran spectators of Alaska politics may be thinking here of Walter Hickel, who in 1990 famously became governor after winning the general election as an Alaska Independence Party candidate after losing that year's GOP nomination. (One problem the post doesn't mention: The AIP does not have a candidate on the ballot for Murkowski to replace as Hickel replaced John Lindauer in 1990, and the filing deadline has passed for candidates who wish to appear on the ballot.) Whatever she decides, Murkowski has until Oct. 28 to file a letter of intent to run as a write-in candidate. Read much more here.