President Donald Trump on Wednesday called for the prosecution of Democratic Senate candidate Mary Peltola following revelations that her campaign allegedly worked to recruit another candidate named Dan Sullivan to confuse voters and undermine Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan’s reelection campaign.
“I think they should be prosecuted,” Trump said of Peltola and the second Sullivan candidate, responding to a New York Times investigation. He had previously warned that “Peltola should suffer the Legal and Political consequences for what she has done.” The controversy comes less than a week before Alaska’s Senate election, a closely watched contest that could determine control of the chamber.
According to the Times, text messages among Peltola campaign staff revealed discussions about recruiting another person named Dan Sullivan to challenge the Republican incumbent. The effort eventually centered on Dan J. Sullivan, a retired schoolteacher from Petersburg, Alaska, who advanced through the August primary and appears on the general-election ballot as Daniel J. Sullivan Jr., without a party affiliation. Alaska uses an open primary followed by ranked-choice voting in the general election.
Dan J. Sullivan has repeatedly denied coordinating with Peltola’s campaign. Asked in June whether he had communicated with her political operation, he responded, “Zero, none, zilch.”
Peltola’s campaign rejected the allegations and criticized Trump’s intervention. “Mary got in this race because Alaskans deserve a champion who is fighting to lower their costs and put Alaska first, and no tweet or threat from any DC politician will keep her away from that fight,” the campaign said. It also maintained that it “has no involvement with either Sullivan campaign,” repeating a denial first issued in June.
A state elections official initially ruled Dan J. Sullivan ineligible for the primary, determining that his candidacy had been submitted “with a purpose to confuse or mislead and to thereby compromise the ballot’s fairness or neutrality.” The Alaska Supreme Court subsequently overturned that decision, allowing him to remain on the ballot.
Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who has endorsed Sullivan despite her longstanding friendship with Peltola, sharply criticized the Democratic candidate. Murkowski said Alaskans “deserve the honest truth from Mary and her campaign — what has been revealed is a pattern of lies and coverups and a culture of deception that belongs nowhere in our elections or among our elected officials.”
Sullivan spokesman Nate Adams accused Peltola and national Democratic organizations of coordinating the effort. “Mary Peltola, her campaign and her senior advisers colluded with the DSCC, national Democrat lawyers and Alaska Democrat operatives to recruit candidates to deliberately confuse and deceive voters,” Adams said.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee denied involvement, stating, “The DSCC is not involved with Dan J. Sullivan.” However, the Times reported that DSCC staff appeared in text exchanges discussing the matter. The investigation drew partly on interviews with Elisa Rios, Peltola’s former campaign manager, who was dismissed in August and later attempted to withdraw her comments.
Trump had previously directed the Justice Department to pursue litigation aimed at preventing certification of the election if Peltola defeats Sullivan. His latest remarks raise the prospect of criminal scrutiny, although no charges have been announced.
Notre Dame election law professor Derek Muller described the situation as “a dirty campaign trick, and it’s good reason the Alaska Supreme Court should have permitted the candidate to have been removed from the ballot. But now it’s in the hands of the voters, not litigation.”
As I wrote back in June, there were good reasons to keep Daniel J. Sullivan, Jr. off the ballot–the Alaska Supreme Court disagreed.https://t.co/03IHJeJgyu https://t.co/PR3O6thZoP pic.twitter.com/T0CzREvTFj
— Derek T. Muller (@derektmuller) October 28, 2026
With voting already underway, the controversy raises questions about whether Democratic operatives deliberately sought to mislead voters in one of the nation’s most consequential Senate races. The courts have allowed both Sullivans to remain on the ballot, leaving Alaskans to sort through the confusion as they decide the election.
