The U.S. Department of Justice filed suit against the Alaska Division of Elections late Thursday, asking a federal court to block the state from certifying its U.S. Senate election result if Democratic candidate Mary Peltola wins. President Donald Trump confirmed Friday that he personally ordered the Trump DOJ Alaska Senate election lawsuit to be filed.
“I’m the one that said, ‘do it,'” Trump told reporters in Florida on Friday.
Peltola is challenging Republican incumbent Sen. Dan S. Sullivan. Polls show her with a small lead, though the race also includes Republican Gerald Heikes of Palmer and undeclared candidate Dan J. Sullivan of Petersburg. The Justice Department’s complaint claims Dan J. Sullivan’s candidacy is “frivolous” and was designed solely to confuse voters and benefit Peltola. Until investigators can determine how much confusion his presence caused, the DOJ argues, Alaska shouldn’t be allowed to certify the result.
Legal experts wasted no time tearing the argument apart. Notre Dame Law School election law professor Derek Muller called it “one of the worst ones I’ve ever seen,” adding that it was not only poorly argued but poorly written, including one paragraph missing a verb needed to actually ask the court for relief.
Former Alaska state elections attorney Libby Bakalar was even blunter, saying on social media Friday morning that the federal argument “is laughably bad, almost to the point of sanctionably frivolous. Watching MAGA on the ropes like this in court up here is a sad and scary sight.”
Of course people who dislike Trump will say things like that. Libby is constantly speaking ill of the Trump administration, so there’s that.
Except what they forgot to tell you was that Trump is actually right about this. There’s a Dan Sullivan on the ballot and the Democrats found another guy named Dan Sullivan and put him on there too. Now there’s two Dan Sullivan’s on the same ballot and it’s actually quite confusing to some people.
That’s why Trump wants this fixed before the election, and threatens a lawsuit after. If it was up to me, then I’d make sure there’s a way to prevent people from being confused. And of course, I wouldn’t flop some random dude named Dan Sullivan into an election just to stir confusion.
The case was assigned to Judge Sharon Gleason, an Obama appointee and the most senior judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska. You can follow the DOJ Alaska Senate lawsuit through court proceedings as the case develops.
Muller told the Beacon by phone that he doesn’t expect the lawsuit to move forward before Election Day anyway. The whole theory rests on voter confusion caused by Dan J. Sullivan’s presence on the ballot. If Sen. Sullivan wins, the confusion was irrelevant. If Peltola wins by more votes than Dan J. Sullivan received, the confusion wasn’t decisive either. “The court’s going to sit and wait till after the election to adjudicate it. Presumably, anyway,” Muller said. He also noted that Alaska’s ranked choice voting system largely neutralizes any confusion, since a voter who ranked both Sullivans would still have their vote count as intended.
Alaska’s courts already settled Dan J. Sullivan’s right to be on the ballot. The state Division of Elections struck him from the primary in June, but an Anchorage Superior Court judge reversed that decision, and the Alaska Supreme Court upheld it. In the August primary, Peltola finished first with 49.5% of the vote, Dan S. Sullivan got 41.4%, and Dan J. Sullivan received just 2.5%. A review by the Anchorage Press found that most of Dan J. Sullivan’s votes came from left-leaning districts, suggesting Democratic-leaning voters, not confused Republicans, drove his totals. “I feel pretty vindicated,” he told local radio station KFSK-FM after those results came out.
Peltola’s campaign didn’t rule out intervening in the suit. Spokesman Harry Child called it “a despicable political threat to overturn an election” and said the campaign will “fight to ensure every single eligible voter in Alaska can make their voice heard.” Sen. Sullivan’s campaign said he didn’t ask for the lawsuit and was surprised by it, with spokesman Nate Adams saying, “We’ll let the DOJ complaint run its course.” The Alaska Division of Elections said through the Department of Law that it is “focused on running the ongoing election” and that the complaint is under review.
Judge Gleason is expected to wait for election results before taking any action. Share your thoughts on the case in the comments below or on social media.
