Alaska's newly elected representative is upbeat about November after the historic special election

 Sarah Palin and the other rival candidates, according to Mary Peltola, share "a sense of friendship."

Mary Peltola, who will represent Alaska in a special election to fill a vacancy in the House this week, declared on Sunday that she is "quite excited about the ranked choice voting system."

The Democratic Party representative said on "Yasmin Vossoughian Reports" on MSNBC, "I'm trying not to get too bogged down in worrying and fretting."

I do, of course, have November in mind. There are only three weeks left to complete the tasks.

In a surprise victory for the Democrats in a special election to fill the seat of Rep. Don Young, who passed away in March after serving nearly 50 years in office, Peltola became the first official elected official in the state using the new ranked-choice voting system. Peltola will need to prevail once more in the general election in November if she wants to keep her seat past the end of the year.

In addition, Peltola talked about her friendship with Republican rival and former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, who allegedly called Peltola "a real Alaskan chick" after Peltola's victory. In the upcoming election, Peltola will go up against both Palin and Republican Nick Begich III.

As the November election draws near, Peltola said, "I do expect attacks, and I have received my fair share of them here in this special election, but I do feel a sense of camaraderie and fraternity with the other people who are running."

Instead of selecting just one option, voters under the new system rank their choices in order of preference. If no candidate receives a majority of the first-place votes, the remaining ballots are distributed to the second- or third-place finishers until one candidate receives more than half of the vote.

The Alaska Democrat may have shed her underdog status for the fall, according to the Cook Political Report's last week update, which changed the race from "likely Republican" to "toss-up."

The first Alaskan to be elected to Congress who was born there is Peltola. She is also only the second Democrat to be elected to the House or U.S. Senate in the previous 40 years, and the first from Alaska to be elected to the House since 1970.