It looks like Alaska has a brand new U.S. Senator. Tuesday night the unofficial numbers show Mayor Mark Begich with a steady lead, after more than 325-thousand votes have been counted.

Mayor Begich is 3,724 votes ahead of Senator Stevens, which is more than a full percentage point.

The Division of Elections says about 2,500 votes are still outstanding and will be counted next week.

Tuesday the Associated Press declared Mayor Mark Begich the winner in the U.S. Senate race between Begich and Senator Ted Stevens.

For the first time in decades, Alaska is on the verge of sending a Democrat to our nation's Capital. Although it's not official until those final ballots are counted on November 25th, Mayor Mark Begich says this race is over and he's ready to take his new seat and new title.

Within minutes of hearing the news, Senator-Elect Mark Begich said, "It was very exciting. These last couple of weeks as you can imagine a lot of activity, but just truly humbled by the amount of support that I've received around the state and the amount of volunteer work for this campaign and especially these last two weeks to get us to where we are today."

Mayor Mark Begich fought a tough campaign against

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incumbent Senator Ted Stevens, the longest-serving Republican Senator in history.

If Stevens were elected, it would've been his 8th consecutive term.

Begich said he's ready to take the challenge, "I felt and sensed that Alaska was shifting, that they were ready to move forward, and they recognize and respect the service of Ted Stevens, but they also recognize that they have to think about Alaska the next thirty, forty years out."

Mayor Mark Begich said he would decide sometime this week when his last day as mayor of Anchorage will be. That final day as Anchorage Mayor will be sometime before January 6th when he will be sworn into the Senate.

CBS 11 News attempted to contact the Stevens Campaign, but no phone calls were returned.

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