Matt Dunlap conceded to Paul LePage, but they’re still headed to a ranked runoff.

The tight race for Maine’s 2nd Congressional District will head to a runoff after no candidate received more than 50% of the vote, Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows announced Thursday.

But this process is unlikely to swing the election. Former Republican Gov. LePage, who holds a 5,400-vote lead among all reporting municipalities, is very likely to win the race. He declared victory at a news conference Wednesday — although the Associated Press has not yet called the race.

And on Thursday afternoon, shortly after Bellows’ announcement, Democratic Auditor Matt Dunlap, LePage’s opponent, conceded victory.

“This is not the result we were hoping for and I am disappointed that we did not succeed. Congratulations to Paul LePage, I wish him the best,” Dunlap said in a press release.

Some voters might be disconcerted by this set of circumstances: Dunlap’s concession, the ranked-choice runoff, the AP’s lack of appeal. Let’s break them down in turn.

Why is the race heading to a ranked second round?

Although the AP’s incomplete results initially showed LePage with more than 50 percent of the vote, that did not include the 6,017 blank ballots cast. The state includes these blank ballots when it determines the 50% threshold necessary to avoid a second round with preferential choice. LePage is just 316 votes away from the winning threshold.

“If no candidate was ranked number one on more than 50 percent of the ballots cast for that particular office, the counting of ranked-choice votes shall be conducted in rounds,” state law states.

That means that starting Monday in Augusta, the secretary of state will begin the ranked-choice voting process with confirmation of the accuracy of the votes cast — a process very similar to a full recount, Bellows said Thursday in an interview with the Portland Press Herald.

Then, the tabulators will eliminate truly blank ballots – those without filled bubbles – from the total. It’s entirely possible that with just a few hundred blank ballots removed, LePage would reach the 50% threshold.

Ballots without a first choice but with a completed second choice come next.

And then the state will count second-choice votes from ballots that initially listed a write-in rather than LePage or Dunlap. This will include the 123 votes for the declared entry, Gregory A. Ward, and an as-yet-unknown number of ballots with other write-ins.

It’s not clear how many blank ballots fall into each category, nor how many voters who wrote in for one candidate chose LePage or Dunlap as their second choice.

If a runoff occurs, why did Dunlap concede?

Political concessions have little impact on the legal vote counting process, and Bellows confirmed Thursday that the runoff would continue.

The state is following precedent: In 2018, when Dunlap was secretary of state, the Republican gubernatorial primary went to a choice runoff despite losing candidates conceding and the party saying the runoff was unnecessary.

In congratulating LePage on his likely victory, Dunlap was simply expressing that he saw no path to victory – a runoff or no runoff.

This analysis is probably correct. With only a few hundred votes missing in LePage, he could cross the 50% threshold in the first round of counting.

LePage senior advisor Brent Littlefield supported his team’s decision to declare victory, saying it is “very clear…that Paul LePage is the elected MP.”

Why didn’t the AP run a race for LePage?

The AP is generally cautious when it comes to calling races for candidates, deciding to do so only when the trailing candidate has no path to victory.

“Can lagging candidates catch up to the leader? Only when the answer is a clear ‘no’ is the race ready to call,” the news agency wrote in an FAQ on its website.

The AP takes candidate concessions into account when making race decisions, but the math is the most important factor. As the race heads into a ranked runoff and with uncertainty over the contents of those 6,017 blank ballots, the news organization has yet to see a theoretical path forward for Dunlap.

Has ranked-choice voting ever decided races in Maine?

Ranked tabulation was also used two years ago during elections in this same constituency. In 2024, the 2nd District race between Democratic incumbent Rep. Jared Golden and Republican Austin Theriault went to a runoff after 3% of voters selected neither candidate.

This runoff began a week after the election and ended three days later, with Golden declared the winner. A subsequent recount confirmed his victory.

After the first round votes were counted, Golden had a lead of 2,159 votes out of nearly 400,000 votes, with approximately 48.65% of the total votes cast. Golden even disputed the need for a recount, saying he received the majority of first-choice votes — but Bellows argued that blank ballots are counted toward the total needed to avoid a runoff.

LePage, however, is much closer to the 50% threshold than Golden and holds a larger lead over his opponent. It is almost certain that he will become the ultimate winner.

If the results are confirmed as his team expects, the former governor’s return to elected office is remarkable in the context of this electoral cycle: LePage would so far become the only Republican in this midterm “blue wave” to flip a seat held by the Democrats in the House of Representatives.

All other Maine elections heavily favored Democrats, with Troy Jackson defeating Sen. Susan Collins and Hannah Pingree easily winning the gubernatorial race. By increasing margins in deep-red rural areas, LePage appears to have completed his latest political comeback.

When he likely wins next week’s automatic runoff, the 78-year-old will be one of the oldest freshman congressmen in American history — a backbencher with little individual legislative power in a heavily Democratic Congress.

What does Golden have to say?

Golden acknowledged LePage’s upset victory Thursday afternoon in a statement on social media.

“I also know a thing or two about winning in difficult circumstances,” he said on