Judge dismisses DOJ lawsuit over ‘Decoy Dan’ Sullivan campaign in Alaska Senate race

A federal judge has rejected an election integrity lawsuit centered on the dual Dan Sullivans appearing on the ballot for the U.S. Senate in Alaska. District Judge Sharon Gleason, appointed by former president Barack Obama, on Nov. 1 dismissed the lawsuit brought by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to halt certification of the Alaska Senate race results should Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan lose.

According to the DOJ, another candidate in the same race, also by the name of Dan Sullivan, could confuse voters and artificially impact the Republican Sullivan’s performance at the voting booth. The New York Times reported last week that operatives affiliated with Democratic candidate Mary Peltola’s campaign were responsible for placing the second Sullivan on the ballot in an apparent effort to split the Republican incumbent’s vote.

The DOJ argued in its lawsuit that the second Sullivan on the ballot will likely “appear confusing to voters looking to vote for [the Republican] Sullivan” and, due to Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system,” could cause enough confusion to result in the Republican Sullivan’s loss.

According to court documents, nearly two weeks after Sullivan filed for election, one Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. also filed for election, requesting to be named on the ballot as “Dan Sullivan” and to be listed as a Republican candidate. Alaska Division of Elections Director Carol Beecher sent the second Sullivan a letter, noting that he was not registered to vote under the name “Dan Sullivan” and was not registered as a Republican.

Beecher also pointed out that the second Sullivan’s campaign website was markedly similar to the Republican Sullivan’s and that one of the second Sullivan’s top campaign staffers was a known Democratic operative, concluding that the second Sullivan’s appearance on the ballot would not be “an actual good-faith candidacy for the office of United States Senator, but was instead filed with a purpose to confuse or mislead and to thereby compromise the ballot’s fairness or neutrality.”

The DOJ said in its lawsuit that “some supporters of [the Republican] Sullivan likely will inadvertently vote for Daniel J. Sullivan,” while “[o]ther supporters of [the Republican] Sullivan likely will be confused as to how to rank the three Republican candidates as to defeat Peltola.”

Gleason dismissed the case Nov. 1 on procedural grounds, reasoning that the DOJ did not present a viable plan for determining how to identify which votes were cast for the second Sullivan in error without violating ballot secrecy provisions.

“The court dismissed the case on procedural grounds but did not dispute the argument of the United States that Daniel J. Sullivan (a/k/a Decoy Dan) entered the race as a frivolous candidate to confuse voters,” said DOJ spokeswoman Kiersten Pels in a statement shared with news outlets responding to Gleason’s dismissal. “Alaskan voters deserve a fair election, not to be misled in an attempt to rig outcomes.”

The DOJ has already announced its intention to appeal Gleason’s dismissal, according to Fox News, although DOJ attorneys have warned that the window of opportunity for preventing fraudulent election activity is rapidly closing.

Don Palmer, a senior legal fellow for election integrity at the Heritage Foundation, told Zeale News that Gleason’s dismissal is “regrettable” because “there are real questions about whether confusion may affect the outcome of the race.”

“There needs to be judicial sunshine on the extent of the fraud perpetrated on the citizens of Alaska, and what remedy exists. The underlying conspiracy to deceive and mislead voters needs to be investigated and whether federal civil rights criminal laws were violated,” he said.

“I anticipate there may be a contest of the race depending on how close the results end up,” Palmer added.

The second Sullivan’s appearance on the ballot has prompted multiple investigations, including a federal criminal probe. The DOJ reportedly issued more than two dozen subpoenas in the case, seeking information on the connection between the second Sullivan’s campaign and Peltola’s.

National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) chairman Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., alleged that the second Sullivan has not even tried to run a basic campaign, citing Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings as evidence that the campaign is a fraudulent effort to damage the Republican Sullivan’s.

“He's actually done nothing trying to achieve the goal of being the senator. He's done one thing, which is to put his name on the ballot to confuse the voters,” Scott said in a Fox News interview.

“The truth is that the fake Dan, the ‘Decoy Dan,’ his one objective is to confuse voters. Number two, if there’s a second point, it’s the collusion that occurred to recruit this candidate. That is a criminal offense,” Scott added. “It is immoral, frankly, to lie to the public about who you are, but it is actually illegal to collude with others in order to confuse the voters.”

Alaska’s Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy has also announced an investigation into the second Sullivan’s campaign and any connection to Peltola’s campaign.

“Our job as executives are to make sure that we can provide our people with an election that everyone could look at it and say that was done with integrity. And right now this cast, unfortunately, a pall over all of this,” he said, according to Fox News.

“We’re compelled to do an investigation on behalf of the people of Alaska, because as they say in Alaska, which is a big fish state, if you can smell the fish way far from the dock, you’ve got a real problem,” he added. “And so, this really does stink.”

Dunleavy has suggested that he will not certify the election results if the Republican Sullivan loses.

The controversy has also drawn the attention of congressional Republicans. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., sent a number of letters Oct. 29 to figures affiliated with both the second Sullivan’s campaign and Peltola’s campaign, demanding that they preserve records so that the Senate can investigate.

“Every American should want to restore confidence and integrity to our election system,” Johnson said in a statement. “The New York Times report on the conspiracy to create confusion in Alaska’s U.S. Senate race details outrageous and possibly criminal behavior on the part of Democrat operatives. The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations has sent a number of records preservation letters to help ensure evidence of wrongdoing is not destroyed.”