Mary Peltola is attempting to wave away a controversy that would make even the most seasoned political operator reach for a scorecard. The Alaska Democratic Senate candidate spoke Wednesday after a New York Times report said her campaign recruited a second candidate named Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. and registered him as Dan S. Sullivan, the same name used by Republican incumbent Senator Dan Sullivan. This was not presented as an innocent paperwork hiccup. The report described it as an effort to confuse voters in a race where every ballot matters.
According to the report, Democrat operative Amber Lee worked over the summer to register Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. as a Republican challenger. The article identifies Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. as a Democrat and says a team of Democrats works with him. His name will appear on the Alaska ballot in the general election next week. That gives voters a remarkably convenient recipe for confusion: one actual Republican incumbent, one Democrat candidate carrying an almost identical name, and a party label that the article says was arranged to make the matchup even murkier. Apparently, campaign strategy now includes turning the ballot into a name recognition quiz.
Peltola did not use her response to explain the reported recruiting effort. Instead, she attacked the story and the incumbent. “This is just another distraction, it’s another diversion,” Peltola said. “Every day, it’s some, you know, new, look over here moment.” She then pivoted to Dan Sullivan, saying, “Not Dan Sullivan, registered Republican, incumbent, voted for this war in Iran 14 times,” she continued. She continued criticizing Sullivan before returning to the newspaper. “This is all stuff just to sell newspapers,” she said. “Nobody at The New York Times cares about affordability in Alaska.”
That response might work for a routine campaign disagreement. It is a harder sell when the allegation involves a deliberately similar candidate name and a general election ballot. Voters should be able to identify candidates without needing to investigate whether a familiar name belongs to the incumbent they know or a newly registered challenger. Calling the coverage a distraction does not make the ballot issue disappear. It leaves the public asking why the campaign is spending so much energy attacking the messenger instead of addressing the reported tactic. The old-fashioned expectation is pretty basic: win votes by making your case, not by making the ballot harder to read.
At a rally in Soldotna today, US Senate candidate Mary Peltola said the media’s focus should be on Alaska’s high cost of living and Sen. Sullivan’s support of the war in Iran — not who is on the ballot.
“Nobody at the New York Times cares about affordability in Alaska.” pic.twitter.com/Ptg9kEOAtH
— Matt Tunseth (@MattTunseth) October 28, 2026
Alaska Republican Governor Mike Dunleavy has ordered a state investigation into Peltola’s U.S. Senate campaign, according to the report. Dunleavy said the Times report “reveals disturbing new evidence of an organized effort to manipulate Alaska’s elections by recruiting candidates, including one with the same name as an incumbent U.S. Senator, to deliberately confuse voters and misdirect their votes.” That is a serious accusation, and an investigation is the appropriate place to sort out who did what, when it happened, and whether election rules were violated. The answer should not depend on which campaign has the louder public relations team. It should depend on the record.
Meanwhile, the political stakes are not small. The report says current polls show Peltola with a narrow lead over the real Dan Sullivan, and the contest could help determine control of the Senate. That makes the alleged decoy operation even more serious from a voter trust standpoint. If a campaign believes its message is strong enough, it should present that message plainly and let Alaskans decide. Recruiting a candidate with an almost matching name, if the allegations are confirmed, looks less like persuasion and more like a shell game. Alaskans deserve a ballot that informs rather than confuses them, and a campaign that answers questions instead of tossing them back at reporters.
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