Legal/Law/Criminal Justice and Reform

Trump DOJ Sues To Block Alaska Senate Results If Dan Sullivan Loses Because Of Another Dan Sullivan

United States Senate - Office of Dan Sullivan, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a lawsuit Friday to block Alaska’s Senate results if Republican Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan lost because of a challenger with the same name.

A challenger with the same name entered the race in June, which raised speculation that he intentionally ran to confuse voters and help former Democratic Alaska Rep. Mary Peltola win. If Sullivan loses, the lawsuit stated that the state would “fail in its obligation to protect the integrity of its election” if they certify the votes.

“Daniel J. Sullivan decided to run for Senator in 2026 as a Republican with the intention of misleading supporters of Senator Sullivan into voting for him. The sole purpose of his candidacy is to benefit the Peltola campaign by reducing the number of votes for Senator Sullivan … Should Alaska certify any electoral results tainted by the inclusion on the ballot of Daniel J. Sullivan—whose candidacy, Defendant Beecher found, is ‘for the purpose of confusing or misleading voters and compromising the fairness of the ballot’—the State and its officers will fail in its obligation to protect the integrity of its election,” the lawsuit stated.

Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher informed Sullivan in an Aug. 26 letter that his declaration of candidacy “was not filed in order to declare an actual good-faith candidacy,” but rather to confuse voters into voting for the wrong Sullivan. After Sullivan appealed the ruling, Superior Court Judge Thomas Matthews ruled he could remain on the ballot for the state’s primary.

The Alaska Supreme Court overturned that ruling in a June 30 decision and allowed the other Sullivan to be on the ballot.

Democratic strategist Amber Lee authored the other Sullivan’s campaign press release on June 4, campaign metadata reviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation showed. Lee publicly supported Peltola’s Senate run and wanted her to run for governor in 2025, according to The Hill.

Alaska has a ranked-choice voting system, which could create a voter confusion issue.

The other Sullivan is a retired schoolteacher from Petersburg. He has donated $650 to Democrats nationwide, including Peltola and left-wing failed Illinois House candidate Kat Abughazaleh, according to Federal Elections Commission (FEC) records.

Peltola visited the other Sullivan’s hometown on May 28, days before he filed to launch his candidacy, according to the Anchorage Daily News.