Alaska Democrat Mary Peltola’s Senate campaign and senior aides at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee backed a months-long effort to recruit spoiler candidates against Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan, including a second man named Dan Sullivan, according to a New York Times investigation published Wednesday.
The report came six days before Election Day. It adds new detail to a fight that began when the Justice Department sued over the namesake candidate earlier this month.
Operatives aligned with Alaska Democratic Senate nominee Mary Peltola spent months recruiting candidates to peel votes from her Republican rival. The group worked to coax would-be spoilers into the race to dilute the incumbent’s support. https://t.co/iUeosQz2ZY
— The New York Times (@nytimes) October 28, 2026
What the Times reported
According to the Times, as summarized by Fox News, the effort was known internally as the “ballot composition project.” It began in the summer of 2025, when a Peltola staffer pulled a list of Alaskans named Dan Sullivan from state voter rolls. Dan J. Sullivan, a retired teacher from Petersburg, switched his registration to Republican shortly before filing for the Senate race.
The Times reported that Democratic operative Jerid Kurtz traveled the state under aliases such as “Zane,” meeting potential recruits in pubs and diners and offering outside financial backing to conservative and independent candidates who would split the right-leaning vote.
Campaign advisers and the DSCC also discussed creating a third-party “MAGA party” to draw votes from Sullivan before dropping the idea in May, the paper reported. Internal messages asked staff whether they needed to “follow up with Jackie about maga party stuff,” a reference to Jacquelyn Lopez of the Elias Law Group, which represents both the DSCC and Peltola’s campaign.
A central source is Peltola’s former campaign manager, Elisa Rios, who was fired in August. She told the Times that Peltola was not directly involved but was “definitely aware.” Rios tried to take back her comments before publication. The Times said her account was backed by text messages, internal documents and 11 other sources.
Sullivan: “A scandal at the highest order”
Sen. Sullivan responded on Hannity Wednesday night. “This is a scandal at the highest order,” he said, according to Fox News. “They’ve been lying for almost a year about it, and now they’re caught.”
President Trump posted on Truth Social Wednesday afternoon, calling it “ELECTION FRAUD” and writing, “I don’t think Mary Peltola, after perpetrating such a terrible scheme, should be allowed to run.” White House Communications Director Steven Cheung shared a post calling it “Democrats’ secret, CORRUPT plan.”
Mary Peltola in August: "It should be a criminal offense to lie or mislead the electorate." https://t.co/4hP2eKogWX
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) October 28, 2026
The federal case
Fox News, citing two sources, reported that federal prosecutors are running an “aggressive criminal investigation” into how the second Sullivan got on the ballot. Separately, the Justice Department’s civil suit asks a federal court to hold up certification if Sen. Sullivan loses and votes for the namesake could have changed the outcome, Fox reported.
Alaska’s Division of Elections tried to keep Dan J. Sullivan off the ballot earlier this year. Director Carol Beecher wrote that his filing “was not filed in order to declare an actual good-faith candidacy,” according to the Daily Caller. State courts overruled her, and he remains on the ballot as “Sullivan, Daniel J. Jr.” with no party listed.
Peltola called the report “just another distraction” meant to “sell newspapers.” Her campaign said it “did not recruit any candidates,” and the DSCC said it had no role in recruiting Republican candidates.
The bottom line
Democrats have spent years telling voters that democracy itself is on the ballot. Now the party’s own Senate campaign arm stands accused, by the New York Times and backed by text messages and 11 sources, of mining voter rolls for men who share a Republican senator’s name, sending an operative around Alaska under a fake name and planning a fake “MAGA party” to split conservative votes.
If the Times account holds up, this was a plan to win by confusing voters rather than persuading them. Alaska’s own election officials saw it for what it was and tried to stop it, and a court let it go forward anyway.
Alaskans now have the facts before they vote. Prosecutors should follow the evidence wherever it leads, including to the DSCC and its lawyers. If Sen. Sullivan’s margin ends up smaller than the namesake’s vote total, the court should give the Justice Department’s request a full hearing.