The Trump administration has asked a federal court to block Alaska from certifying its U.S. Senate election if Republican incumbent Sen. Dan S. Sullivan loses the Nov. 3 race — an extraordinary preemptive move in a contest that could decide control of the Senate. The Justice Department filed the lawsuit on Thursday, Oct. 22, in federal court in Anchorage, citing potential voter confusion from a second candidate with nearly the same name on the ballot. President Donald Trump told reporters on Oct. 23 that he personally directed the department to file it: "I'm the one that said do it," he said, per USA Today.
What the lawsuit seeks
The complaint, United States v. Alaska (No. 3:26-cv-00376), filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska, names the state, Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher and the state's election boards. It asks the court to prevent certification of "any result that may be impacted by voter confusion" pending an investigation into whether votes cast for Daniel J. Sullivan "were meant to be cast for Senator Sullivan." The department's only legal claim rests on the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, citing one of the law's stated purposes: "to protect the integrity of the electoral process."
Election-law experts are skeptical. Notre Dame professor Derek Muller called the theory "strange and unusual," saying he had never seen the voter-registration law's preamble used this way and that "the statute simply doesn't let the Department of Justice enjoin certification." Attorney General Todd Blanche insisted, "It is not DOJ's intention to and it's never our intention to improperly interfere with elections," per the AP.
The two Sullivans on the Nov. 3 ballot
The incumbent, Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, a Republican who has held the seat since 2015, appears on the ballot as "Registered Republican" and "incumbent." Alongside him is Daniel J. Sullivan of Petersburg, a retired schoolteacher listed without a party affiliation. Democrat Mary Peltola, a former U.S. representative, is also on the ballot, along with Republican Gerald Heikes.
The suit alleges Daniel J. Sullivan ran "with the intention of misleading supporters of Senator Sullivan into voting for him," calling his candidacy's "sole purpose" the benefit of the Peltola campaign, and says his campaign website copies the senator's site. He has denied being a Democratic plant or trying to mislead voters, per the AP.
Alaska elections director Carol Beecher ruled June 15 that the challenger had not filed a "good-faith candidacy" but one "with a purpose to confuse or mislead" voters. The Alaska Supreme Court summarily kept him on the Nov. 3 ballot after earlier Republican efforts to remove him failed. In the August primary, the incumbent won 68,726 votes to Daniel J. Sullivan's 4,107, per CNN.
Alaska uses ranked-choice voting in its general elections, and polling has shown Peltola tied with or slightly ahead of the incumbent in a state Trump carried by about 14 percentage points in 2024.
Reactions and the stakes for Senate control
Peltola campaign spokesperson Harry Child blasted the lawsuit, vowing to fight to protect eligible voters' votes. The race is one of roughly 10 battleground Senate contests this November: Democrats need to net four seats to take the majority, and Alaska is among the GOP-held states they hope to flip.
Whether a federal judge accepts a voter-registration statute's preamble as grounds to hold a state's certification is now the open question. The election is Nov. 3; if polling is right, the two Sullivans on the ballot — and the lawsuits around them — may shape who holds the seat.
Music in this post's reel: Kevin MacLeod - Volatile Reaction (incompetech.com), licensed under CC BY 3.0