WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department is escalating a criminal investigation over an Alaska Senate candidate who shares a name with the Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan, issuing a raft of new grand jury subpoenas, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press on Thursday.
Subpoenas seeking grand jury testimony or documents, along with records preservation demands, were issued after The New York Times reported that Democratic candidate Mary Peltola’s campaign appeared to be involved in recruiting Dan J. Sullivan Jr. as part of an alleged effort to confuse voters in the hotly contested race.
More subpoenas were expected to be sent Thursday, according to a person briefed on the investigation who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the ongoing probe. Neither the recipients of the subpoenas nor the total number of them were immediately clear.
It’s the latest aggressive move by the Justice Department in a politically sensitive matter in the weeks leading up to Tuesday’s midterm elections. The Justice Department has historically avoided taking overt investigative actions against candidates in the weeks before an election, or other public steps that could be perceived as attempting to influence a political outcome.
Election law experts said they were unaware of what federal law would justify the investigation.
“I don’t know what they’re putting out subpoenas to investigate because I don’t know what federal violations are implicated that DOJ would have jurisdiction over,” said Justin Levitt, a former Department of Justice official under President Joe Biden. “Sure makes it seem like the point of the investigation is to become the story.”
The information came to light the same day that the U.S. Justice Department issued subpoenas to California officials in an escalation of its scrutiny of local election administration. Earlier Thursday, a federal judge in California appointed a special master to evaluate claims by the Trump administration that the state has some 20,000 noncitizens on its voter rolls. That action came less than 24 hours after the judge rejected the Justice Department’s demand that California sequester the ballots until citizenship can be verified, a ruling the department immediately appealed.
Race is among a handful that could determine control of the Senate
For months, the Justice Department has been looking into allegations that Dan J. Sullivan Jr. entered the race to mislead voters and help Peltola’s campaign. The potential targets of the Justice Department’s investigation are unclear, but President Donald Trump earlier this week called for the criminal prosecution of Peltola and her campaign.
The new subpoenas were confirmed by a person briefed on the investigation who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the ongoing probe.
Attorney General Todd Blanche in a Fox News interview on Wednesday said he wouldn’t discuss any criminal investigations, but accused Democrats of “cheating.”
“They are trying to take votes away from the incumbent, not by running an election, not by running on issues but by putting up a person with the same name,” Blanche said.
The race is among a handful of Senate contests this year expected to determine control of the chamber. Trump had previously directed his Department of Justice to sue to block certification of the Senate race should Democrat Mary Peltola defeat Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan.
Dan J. Sullivan has long denied he was running at Democrats’ behest and has said he had no contact with Peltola’s campaign. “Zero, none, zilch,” he said in June after announcing his run.
Alaska’s Republican governor has also ordered an investigation
Separately, Republican Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy has ordered an investigation into Peltola, saying the newspaper’s reporting “reveals disturbing new evidence of an organized effort to manipulate Alaska’s elections.”
“Deliberately tricking voters into casting their ballots for someone else strikes at the integrity of our elections,” Dunleavy added, noting that the reporting “substantially supports” earlier findings by the state’s elections board into the matter.
Trump on Thursday cast doubt on whether Peltola would be seated in the Senate even if she won the election. “Well, you’re going to have to see what happens,” the president told reporters on his way to a rally in South Carolina. “It’s hard to believe that she could even be allowed to run.”
Later, as he rallied for GOP Sen. Darline Graham, Trump said he felt Peltola “actually should be removed from the ballot and prosecuted.”
Peltola dismisses the claims as a ‘distraction’
Peltola’s campaign didn’t immediately respond to a message Thursday seeking comment on Dunleavy’s order. But during a campaign stop in Soldotna, Peltola, a former congresswoman, suggested the Times’ report was a “distraction” from issues such as Sen. Sullivan’s support of the war in Iran.
“This is just another distraction. It’s another diversion,” she said in a video posted online. “This is all stuff to sell newspapers. This is all stuff to get subscriptions.”
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which The New York Times’ story alleges was involved in the effort to recruit the other Dan Sullivan, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The situation in Alaska isn’t that unusual. Political parties often support extra candidates on ballots to try to pull votes from their rivals. If state courts allow it, legal experts say, the federal government has no role challenging the results.
In Ohio’s Senate race, Republicans have been tied to an effort to boost a socialist on the ballot who would pull votes from the Democratic candidate challenging Sen. Jon Husted.
On Thursday, Vice President JD Vance didn’t go as far as Trump did in calling for Peltola to be prosecuted but said he supported a probe into possible election fraud.
“I mean, she is a person who, for months now, has pretended that she has had nothing to do with the fact that they have put a fraudulent person, a person explicitly designed to confuse Alaska voters, on the ballot,” Vance told reporters ahead of a campaign trip to Texas. “She is trying to steal a Senate seat from the voters of Alaska, and it’s disgraceful.”
State Supreme Court OK’d the other Sullivan on the ballot
Earlier this year, a top state elections official ruled Daniel J. Sullivan Jr., a retired schoolteacher, ineligible for the primary ballot, concluding that his declaration of candidacy was filed “with a purpose to confuse or mislead and to thereby compromise the ballot’s fairness or neutrality.”
The case went to the Alaska Supreme Court, which ruled he was qualified to run. Alaskan voters will see “Dan S. Sullivan” identified as a “registered Republican” and “incumbent” on their ballots, while “Daniel J. Sullivan Jr.” will not have a party affiliation.
The New York Times reported that interviews, text messages and documents prepared for a potential lawsuit showed Peltola’s team aimed to coax candidates into the race, with the aim of splitting support for the GOP senator.
Asked about the reporting on Wednesday, Trump told journalists, “I think they should be prosecuted.”
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Meg Kinnard can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP. AP writers Seung Min Kim, Nick Riccardi and Ali Swenson contributed to this report.
By ALANNA DURKIN RICHER and MEG KINNARD
Associated Press
