abstract
| - Joseph Wayne "Joe" Miller (born May 10, 1967) is an American attorney who was the Republican Party nominee and the Tea Party favorite in the 2010 U.S. Senate election in Alaska. He faced Democrat Scott McAdams and incumbent Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, who after losing the primary to Miller, mounted a large and well-funded campaign as a write-in candidate in the general election. Miller then received the second largest number of votes, (35 percent), in the November 2 general election; write-ins came in first (at 41 percent). Election officials hand counted the write-ins using a voter intent standard which allowed ballots with misspellings of Lisa Murkowski's name to count for Murkowski, which gave her a lead of over 10,000 votes. Miller's campaign challenged 8,000 of the write in ballots, contending that state law required exact spelling, last name before first, no cross-outs and no additional words such as "Republican". He filed two state court and one federal lawsuit and later one state supreme court appeal, claiming constitutional violations of equal protection, the election clause of the U.S. constitution, and voter fraud as well as violations of the state election statute. The cases were dismissed by the courts because even if Miller had been correct about the law, he would still have lost to Murkowski by at least 2,000 votes. Miller conceded defeat on December 31, and claimed that his battle had been to ensure voter confidence in the election process and transparency. During the election, Miller ran on the Tea Party platform of reduced taxes and government, opposition to abortion, repeal of the health care law passed by the Democrats in 2010, and restriction of federal earmarks for local projects. Controversies concerned the handcuffing of a journalist during a campaign event by Miller's event security, the Miller campaign's release of a recording indicating television reporters intent to smear Miller, and the use, by Miller, of three computers owned by the Fairbanks North Star Borough for political purposes unrelated to his run for US Senate. Before running for the Senate, Miller worked as an attorney in private general practice, as a local government attorney, and as a U.S. magistrate judge assisting the Alaska federal district court with its caseload. He is a 1995 graduate of Yale Law School, a combat veteran of the 1991 Gulf War, and a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Originally from Kansas and the father of eight children, he and his wife and family moved to Alaska in the mid 1990s. In May 2013, he announced that he would seek the Republican Nomination to challenge incumbent Democratic Senator Mark Begich in 2014.
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