Dirty tricks or much ado about nothing? Why Alaska, for once, is front and centre in midterms

The presence of two candidates named Dan Sullivan on the Alaska ballot for a Senate election has attracted attention for about six months now in U.S. political news coverage.

Right-wing media outlets have suspected it was not a mere coincidence, but an example of chicanery, and an investigation by the New York Times resulted in an article Wednesday that suggests a co-ordinated effort by individuals associated with Democrat Mary Peltola's campaign to recruit anyone with the same name as Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan.

A spokesperson for the Peltola campaign had previously said it had "no involvement with either Sullivan campaign."

While political action committees and campaigns for both parties have occasionally engaged in similar "ballot-stacking" tactics that appeared to have the express purpose of siphoning votes from well-established politicians, the Alaska scenario is perhaps the most high-profile example yet seen.

Attorney General Todd Blanche said Wednesday it "should be" illegal, and U.S. President Donald Trump has suggested that criminal prosecutions should result, without specifying on what grounds, or for which particular individuals.

Here's a look at how we got here and the questions that have emerged ahead of Tuesday's midterms.

The facts

Several candidates appeared on the Senate ballot in the spring, including incumbent Dan Sullivan, whose middle name is Scott. But also on the ballot was Republican Dan J. Sullivan. A retired schoolteacher, he is a neophyte in terms of political office and has registered as a Democrat in the past.

In June, the state's Republican lieutenant-governor disqualified Dan J. Sullivan under a state regulation that forbids ballot names that are "confusing or misleading to voters or compromises the fairness or neutrality of the ballot."

A campaign spokesperson for Democratic Senate hopeful Mary Peltola, seen in Anchorage, Alaska, on Oct. 14, has previously said it had 'no involvement with either Sullivan campaign.' (Becky Bohrer/The Associated Press)

But a state judge's reversal of that decision was upheld by the Alaska Supreme Court. The gist of their ruling was that there is no statutory or constitutional mechanism to remove a person from the ballot if they had met the qualifications to register as a candidate, no matter the origin story of the candidacy.

"There's a lot of different ways you can distinguish these two candidates on the ballot, short of precluding access to the ballot to begin with," Aimee Oravec, an Alaska justice, said during oral arguments in the case.

Why it matters

What the composition of the Senate will look like after its three-dozen races are called is seen as an unpredictable puzzle by pollsters. Republicans hold a 53-47 majority ⁠and Democrats need four pickups to regain control of the chamber, so the race between Peltola and the incumbent Sullivan could be pivotal.

Alaska is one of the smallest electorates. Sullivan was elected to office in 2014 by two percentage points, which translated to just over 6,000 more votes than his opponent.

In the all-party primary in August to determine the top four candidates, the candidate derisively nicknamed "Decoy Dan" by some garnered 4,107 votes, about 2 per cent of the total vote. This despite the fact he's reportedly spent no money on campaign staff or media.

Democrats have defended the manoeuvre as an example of political hardball. They have pointed to examples nationally of Republican-led efforts to place candidates on ballots as a diversionary tactic, and Alaska Democrats alleged in 2024 that Republicans were behind a scheme to get an incarcerated candidate — who's running again this year — on the ballot to siphon votes from their preferred U.S. House candidate.

Peltola and her campaign haven't fully addressed the Times allegations, merely calling it a "diversion." The revelation could backfire for Peltola, a Yup'ik who became the first Indigenous person from Alaska to ever serve in Congress when she won a House seat in 2022.

In addition to Sullivan, Republican Lisa Murkowski, the other U.S. senator from Alaska, is calling for her to come clean about her knowledge of the scheme.

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The gambit could also just breed more general cynicism in a country where unfounded allegations of vote fraud in the 2020 election led to a riot at the U.S. Capitol.

"How does this increase voter confidence in our election process?" the Juneau Empire, the newspaper out of the state capital, asked in a recent editorial.

Legal fallout

After the Times article landed, Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy said he was directing the state's Department of Public Safety to investigate the scheme to see if criminal or civil offences occurred.

"Deliberately tricking voters into casting their ballots for someone else strikes at the integrity of our elections," said Dunleavy.

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Several days before the Times exposé landed, the Justice Department filed a lawsuit to demand that Alaska be blocked from certifying a Peltola win if Dan J. Sullivan remains on the ballot.

Trump said he had ordered the department to do that and no criticism emerged in Congress from Republicans who regularly lobbed accusations about a politicized Justice Department under Democratic predecessor Joe Biden.

Legal questions

It is hard to predict if any criminality occurred, given what is known so far. But vote-siphoning schemes have led to charges for individuals before.

As for the Justice Department suit, the U.S. Constitution grants states the power to run their own elections. Election experts are pessimistic about its chances for success, and even the Trump-friendly Wall Street Journal editorial page called it a "legal Hail Mary."

"The statute simply doesn't let the Department of Justice enjoin certification," Derek Muller, University of Notre Dame law professor, told the Associated Press last week. "The lawsuit could well be mooted by a wide Democratic victory or a narrow Republican one, and if not, the court will likely dismiss it next month."

The lawsuit asks the court to block certification until an investigation determines whether enough voters were fooled in a way that swings the election. It doesn't explain how that would happen, and the right to privacy provides another complication, as votes are supposed to be confidential.

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Election expert Rick Hasen called the Times report a "bombshell" and said perjury prosecutions were possible if it could be established someone lied about involvement in the scheme. But Hasen, UCLA law professor and director of the Safeguarding Democracy Project, wrote Wednesday on his blog that he didn't think the new reporting changed the equation on the Justice Department suit.

Hasen also said he didn't see any mechanism for the government to criminalize Dan J. Sullivan's campaign.

"And if it could do so, then it could be a crime every time that the Republican Party backs a Green Party candidate, or Democrats support a MAGA candidate in a primary in the hopes that the candidate would be weaker against a Democrat in the general election," he said.

The ballot wrinkle

A sample election ballot for Alaska shows how the two Sullivan's running for a Senate seat are being distinguished. (Haven Daley/The Associated Press)

Alaska employs a ranked-choice ballot. Some local editorials, as well as the Wall Street Journal, have argued that such a system encourages the possibility of voter confusion and sham candidates.

Democrats counter that the local electorate has likely been inundated for months with stories and video differentiating the two men. In addition, they say, a voter could just simply choose not to rank Peltola at all on their ballot, with the likelihood that the less seasoned Sullivan comes out on top over the man who's represented Alaska for over a decade considered remote.

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It's not the citizenry's first go-round with the system, which has been in place since 2022. Even Republican Murkowski, criticizing the Justice Department suit last week, has said that "Alaskans don't need any help voting for their preferred candidates."

It is too late to change ballots. Dan J. Sullivan is listed as "Daniel J. Sullivan Jr.," without a party label, and Dan S. Sullivan is listed as "Dan S. Sullivan (Registered Republican) Incumbent."