Former Anchorage Mayor Dan A. Sullivan stepped into Alaska's already chaotic Senate race to endorse incumbent Sen. Dan S. Sullivan over a third candidate also named Dan Sullivan, a contest now under investigation by state and federal prosecutors.
The endorsement, posted on Facebook, carried a line that captured the absurdity of the situation. The former mayor called himself "the OG Dan Sullivan" and urged Alaskans to back the senator, adding: "He's been great for Alaska." The post landed as a grand jury was issuing subpoenas tied to the third Sullivan's campaign and the Cook Political Report was rating the seat a toss-up heading into November.
Alaska's Senate contest features three men who share the same surname. Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, the Republican incumbent, is running for re-election. Dan J. Sullivan, a retired teacher running as a Republican, entered the race and promptly drew accusations that his candidacy exists to siphon votes from the senator by confusing the ballot. And Dan A. Sullivan, the former Anchorage mayor who is not running, decided the situation required him to weigh in publicly so voters could tell the difference.
The race moved beyond political curiosity when state and federal prosecutors in Alaska opened an investigation into whether the contest could be part of a conspiracy to confuse voters. NBC News reported that a grand jury issued subpoenas this month to compel information from witnesses linked to Dan J. Sullivan's campaign.
Sen. Dan S. Sullivan and fellow Republicans have alleged that Dan J. Sullivan was placed on the ballot specifically to detract from the senator's vote share, claiming the retired teacher is working with Mary Peltola, the Democratic former U.S. Representative who is also in the race. Both Dan J. Sullivan and Peltola have denied any coordination.
The denials have not quieted the suspicion. When a candidate with identical name recognition to the incumbent appears on the same ballot, running under the same party label, and then a grand jury starts subpoenaing his associates, the situation has moved well past coincidence in the eyes of the senator's allies.
Alaska's election system adds another layer. The state uses an all-party primary in which the top four finishers advance to the general election regardless of affiliation. The general election is then decided by ranked-choice voting, a format that rewards strategic positioning and can punish candidates whose vote share gets split. In a race where two Republicans share a last name, that structure creates obvious opportunities for mischief, intentional or otherwise.
Results from the primary, held last week, showed Peltola leading with 48 percent of the vote. Sen. Dan S. Sullivan placed second at 43 percent. Dan J. Sullivan pulled just 2.4 percent, a small share, but potentially meaningful in a ranked-choice general election where margins can be razor-thin. NBC News had not yet called which candidates beyond the senator and Peltola would fill the remaining two general-election slots.
That 2.4 percent is the number that matters for anyone trying to understand the investigation. In a toss-up race, even a small sliver of confused voters checking the wrong Sullivan box could tip the outcome. If the candidacy was designed to produce exactly that confusion, prosecutors apparently want to know who designed it and why.
The Cook Political Report's toss-up rating underscores the stakes. Alaska is one of the few states where a Republican Senate seat is genuinely at risk, and recent Senate battles have shown how narrow the GOP's margin for error is on any given race.
The legal battle over the third Sullivan's candidacy predates the criminal investigation. The Alaska Division of Elections originally disqualified Dan J. Sullivan from the ballot. The specific basis for that disqualification was not detailed in available reporting, but the decision did not stick. The Alaska Supreme Court ruled last month that Dan J. Sullivan can remain on the ballot, overturning the elections division.
That ruling kept the name-confusion dynamic alive heading into the primary, and now into the general election. It also means that whatever evidence the Division of Elections found sufficient to disqualify the candidate, Alaska's highest court disagreed on the legal merits.
The separate criminal investigation suggests prosecutors believe there may be something beyond a simple ballot dispute. Grand jury subpoenas are not issued over paperwork errors. They are tools for investigating potential criminal conduct, and the fact that both state and federal authorities are involved signals that the matter has drawn serious attention from law enforcement at multiple levels.
Senate Republicans have been fighting to hold and expand their majority through a bruising legislative calendar. The chamber recently approved a $69.5 billion immigration enforcement package after internal party disagreements nearly derailed it, and every seat matters for maintaining the votes needed to keep that agenda moving.
Dan A. Sullivan's Facebook endorsement was notable not just for its content but for the fact that it needed to exist at all. A former Republican mayor of Alaska's largest city does not typically need to explain to voters which Dan Sullivan they should support for U.S. Senate. The post amounted to a public-service announcement wrapped in a political endorsement.
His self-identification as "the OG Dan Sullivan" was pointed. It drew a clear line: there is an original, there is the incumbent senator, and then there is a third entrant whose presence on the ballot has generated a criminal investigation. The former mayor wanted no ambiguity about where he stood, or which Sullivan deserved the vote.
The broader Alaska political landscape has produced its share of unusual dynamics in recent cycles. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the state's other Republican senator, has herself broken with her party on key votes, a reminder that Alaska's politics do not always follow the national playbook.
Several critical facts remain unresolved. The investigation is ongoing, and no charges have been filed. The specific evidence behind the prosecutors' theory, that the race may involve a deliberate conspiracy to confuse voters, has not been made public beyond the existence of the subpoenas themselves.
Dan J. Sullivan has denied coordinating with the Peltola campaign, but he has not offered a detailed public explanation of how his candidacy originated or who supported it. Peltola has similarly denied any involvement with the second Sullivan campaign. Whether the grand jury's work produces indictments, clears the participants, or simply fades from view before November remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, the Senate's packed legislative schedule continues, and the outcome in Alaska could determine whether Republicans hold the votes to keep advancing their priorities or lose ground to a Democratic pickup in a state that has historically leaned red.
What is not ambiguous is the pattern. A Republican incumbent faces a toss-up race. A candidate with his exact last name appears on the ballot under the same party label, drawing just enough votes to matter. Prosecutors convene a grand jury. And a former mayor with the same surname has to go on Facebook to tell voters which Sullivan is real. If this is all a coincidence, it is the most convenient one Democrats have stumbled into in years.
