The newspaper obtained text messages between members of Democrat Mary Peltola's campaign discussing recruiting other people with the same name as the two-term Republican their candidate was running against. They eventually landed on a retired schoolteacher in the small fishing community of Petersburg named Dan J. Sullivan. He made it through the state's August open primary and is one of four candidates on the ranked vote ballot for next Tuesday's general election.
Dan J. Sullivan has long denied he was running at Democrats’ behest and has said he had no contact with Peltola's campaign: “Zero, none, zilch,” he said in June after announcing his run.
He did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment Wednesday from The Associated Press.
A top state elections official ruled Dan J. Sullivan ineligible for the ballot after he declared his candidacy, claiming it was “filed with a purpose to confuse or mislead and to thereby compromise the ballot’s fairness or neutrality.”
But the Alaska Supreme Court struck that down.
“Alaskans deserve the truth,” said Nate Adams, a spokesperson for Sen. Sullivan’s campaign. “Mary Peltola, her campaign and her senior advisers colluded with the DSCC, national Democrat lawyers and Alaska Democrat operatives to recruit candidates to deliberately confuse and deceive voters.”
The campaign for Peltola, a former congresswoman, did not immediately respond Wednesday to a request for comment. Democrats, including the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, have repeatedly denied that they were involved in any campaign trick.
The Times story about the recruitment of Dan J. Sullivan is based partly on interviews with Peltola's former campaign manager, Elisa Rios, who was fired in August amid a campaign shake-up. The newspaper said she tried to retract her comments last week.
As of Monday, 46,204 ballots had already been cast in Alaska, according to AP data. Sen. Sullivan is marked on the ballot as the Republican incumbent. The other Sullivan is listed as Daniel J. Sullivan Jr., with no party affiliation.
