The top federal prosecutor in Alaska confirmed on Friday the existence of a criminal and a civil investigation into an alleged scheme by Democrats to confuse voters by recruiting a spoiler candidate on the ballot for US Senate who shares a name with the Republican incumbent, senator Dan Sullivan.
Speaking at a news conference in Anchorage on Friday, US attorney Michael Heyman cited reporting by the New York Times which suggested that the Senate campaign of Democrat Mary Peltola and national Democrats had, in his words, “orchestrated a sprawling conspiracy to recruit and prop up Daniel J Sullivan as a sham candidate”.
Both Dan Sullivans – one a Republican senator and the other a retired schoolteacher with no prior political experience – qualified for the ballot.
“We are taking that extremely seriously,” Heyman said.
“This new information has resulted in a significant surge of law enforcement assets to Alaska,” he added. “As we speak, law enforcement around the country are taking investigative steps with respect to a criminal investigation on these matters.”
In a separate filing, the Department of Justice asked a federal judge to order state elections officials to isolate ballots ranking Dan J Sullivan to investigate potential voter “confusion” with the incumbent Dan Sullivan.
E. Bryan Wilson, an assistant US attorney in Alaska, in a filing, said the government “seeks to preserve and segregate all ballots ranking Daniel J Sullivan for the purposes of investigating whether such ranking was the product of voter confusion, should such an investigation become necessary”.
The justice department on Friday also asked a federal judge to issue a preliminary injunction that would block Alaska from certifying its Senate election result if the incumbent senator loses to Peltola due to the presence of Daniel J Sullivan on the ballot.
Heyman would not say what potential crimes authorities are looking into. It is highly unusual for federal prosecutors to confirm the existence of an open criminal investigation, much less discuss it publicly.
“The civil lawsuit is publicly faced, and is focused on preserving the ballots,” Heyman said, referring to a Department of Justice suit filed last week.
A day earlier, Peltola denied any prior knowledge of the alleged effort, telling supporters in Juneau, Alaska’s capital: “I am not interested in tricking voters.”
“I just want to clear the air,” the Democratic Senate candidate said on Thursday at the top of a speech in a downtown bar in Juneau, Alaska’s capital. “I knew nothing about any other candidate on the ballot except for me and the incumbent. That is all I have ever known about.”
Peltola is running against Dan Sullivan, the two-term US senator. A person familiar with the matter told the Associated Press that subpoenas seeking grand jury testimony or documents, along with records preservation demands, were issued after the New York Times reported that Peltola’s campaign appeared to be involved in recruiting Dan J Sullivan Jr as part of an alleged effort to confuse voters.
The race is considered one of the most important contests of next week’s midterm elections, and will be key to determining control of the Senate. Alaska is one of a handful of states with Senate races this year that Democrats are targeting as they try to win back a majority in the chamber, where they hold 47 seats to the Republican party’s 53, and recent polls have shown Peltola in the lead.
More subpoenas were expected, according to the person who spoke to the Associated Press. Neither the recipients of the subpoenas nor the number of them were immediately clear.
Republicans have condemned the presence in the race of two candidates named Dan Sullivan, calling the newcomer a ploy by Democrats to cost the incumbent re-election by splitting the GOP candidate’s supporters.
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Before the August primary, election authorities in the state attempted to disqualify the other Dan Sullivan, but the state supreme court ruled that he could appear on the ballot. Together with Sullivan and Peltola, the challenger was one of the top four vote-getters in the non-partisan primary.
On the general election ballot, the senator will be listed as “Sullivan, Dan S. (Registered Republican) Incumbent” and the challenger “Sullivan, Daniel J. Jr.”
Since the New York Times published its report, Mike Dunleavy, Alaska’s Republican governor, separately announced plans to launch a criminal investigation, saying the story revealed “disturbing new evidence of an organized effort to manipulate Alaska’s elections by recruiting candidates – including one with the same name as an incumbent US senator – to deliberately confuse voters and misdirect their votes”.
“Deliberately tricking voters into casting their ballots for someone else strikes at the integrity of our elections,” Dunleavy added, noting that the report “substantially supports” earlier findings by the state’s elections board into the matter.
Donald Trump on Thursday cast doubt on whether Peltola would be seated in the Senate if she won the election.
“Well, you’re going to have to see what happens,” the president told reporters on his way to a rally in South Carolina. “It’s hard to believe that she could even be allowed to run.”
Later, as he rallied for Darline Graham, a Republican senator, Trump said he felt Peltola “actually should be removed from the ballot and prosecuted”.
The Associated Press contributed reporting