By: Corinne Smith, Alaska Beacon
The Alaska Division of Elections announced that the state intends to disqualify a Petersburg candidate from Alaska’s U.S. Senate race. Dan J. Sullivan has the same first and last name as the incumbent senator. The decision comes after complaints from the incumbent and Republican Party groups and eligibility concerns.
The decision is preliminary, and the division gave no timeline for a final decision.
Dan J. Sullivan, a retired teacher from Petersburg, announced his candidacy last month, along with 15 candidates challenging the Republican incumbent U.S. Sen. Dan S. Sullivan for the seat.
The incumbent Sen. Sullivan and Republican groups criticized him as a “sham candidate” and said his candidacy is illegitimate and aimed at confusing voters to the benefit of the Democratic candidate, Mary Peltola.
Sullivan from Petersburg has defended his candidacy as authentic, and said he has complied with filing rules and has the right to run for the seat. He declined to comment on the preliminary decision on Friday.
Carol Beecher, division director, issued a preliminary decision on Wednesday, writing to the Petersburg Sullivan that the division had determined “that a preponderance of evidence does not support your eligibility for the office of U.S. Senate.”
Beecher did not provide the evidence or give a specific reason. She said the candidate had until 5 p.m. Friday to respond, and the state would issue a final decision with or without his response. Her office did not respond to a request for comment about the reasoning behind the preliminary decision to disqualify Sullivan on Thursday.
Beecher cited two complaints brought against Sullivan, one by the Alaska Republican Party which accused the Petersburg Sullivan of misrepresenting himself as a Republican. The group said at the time of filing for the seat he was registered to vote as “undeclared.”
The Petersburg Sullivan said he was affiliated with the Alaska Independence Party until it disbanded last year, then filed for the seat as a Republican.
The state’s filing form gives an option for candidates to change registered parties in a note under party affiliation.
The preliminary announcement to disqualify Sullivan came just hours after the candidate responded to questions by a deadline issued by the Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom’s office, which launched an investigation into the candidate on Monday.
Dahlstrom, a Republican, asked the candidate about his affiliation with the Republican Party, names he has used to register to vote, design decisions on his campaign website and logo and whether he has coordinated with the Democratic Party. The lieutenant governor said false statements could carry the penalty of perjury. She questioned whether Sullivan was running with “the deliberate intent to confuse voters.”
Sullivan denied the allegations, saying he was running under his lawful name as a Republican, and denied any affiliation with outside groups.
On Thursday evening, he issued a statement criticizing Dahlstrom’s actions and the message they send to voters.
“I am a qualified candidate who followed the rules and filed to run for office under my legal name. Yet, unsupported accusations have been given credibility while political operatives continue their effort to keep me off the ballot. Alaskans have every reason to ask whether this process is being driven by politics rather than by a fair application of the law,” he wrote.
A spokesperson for the Peltola campaign denied any connection to the candidate on Friday. “Our campaign has no involvement with either Sullivan campaign,” said Harry Child by email. The Alaska Democratic Party also denied involvement with the candidate.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee, which works to elect Republicans, filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission that accused the candidate of violating federal law, and said he was working with political strategist, Amber Lee, to misrepresent his campaign. Sullivan said he was working with Lee, but denied the claims.
Sen. Sullivan’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment on the state’s preliminary decision to remove Sullivan from the ballot on Friday.
Demonstrators in Juneau took to the street Friday morning, protesting outside the Alaska Division of Elections office in support of Sullivan.
Anjuli Grantham with the grassroots advocacy group Juneau for Democracy said she doesn’t know Sullivan personally, but was out protesting in support. She said he meets qualifications for candidates under Alaska law, including being over 30 years old, a U.S. citizen and a resident of the state.
“And so what this actually is, it’s a sign of authoritarian slippage on the part of the state of Alaska,” she said. “In dictatorships, they control elections by deciding who will be on the ballot. And so we’re out here because it’s our constitutional right to run for office.”
Grantham also pointed to the division’s decision to share confidential voter information with the U.S. Department of Justice, a choice that some fear will be used to scrub Alaska voters from the rolls. Civil rights groups have filed a lawsuit against the Division of Elections saying it was a violation of voters’ privacy rights.
“That was very likely in violation of our state constitutional rights to privacy,” she said. “And so what we’re seeing now is another what seems to be anti-constitutional action on the part of the Division of Elections, so we’re here as democracy defenders and as people who are standing up to authoritarianism,” Grantham said.
