In a rather strange lawsuit — United States v. State of Alaska, filed on October 23 — the US Department of Justice asked a court to block that state’s election authority from certifying an election result that isn’t even known yet and won’t be known until, at the earliest, November 3.
Weird enough, but it gets even weirder: DOJ wants certification of the result blocked if, and only if, incumbent US Senator Dan Sullivan loses the election. If he wins? Move along, nothing to see here.
The “problem,” DOJ claims, is that voters may be “confused” by the presence of two Dan Sullivans on the ballot — the aforementioned Daniel S. Sullivan, a Republican, and “independent” Daniel J. Sullivan — in addition to Democrat Mary Peltola and a second Republican, Gerald L. Heikes.
In other words, DOJ wants the court to rule that Alaska’s voters are really, really stupid.
So stupid that they’re incapable of distinguishing Daniel S. Sullivan, who’s clearly marked on the ballot as both a Republican and the incumbent, from Daniel J. Sullivan, who appears with no party designation next to his name.
So stupid that there needs to be a magical new judge-made law forbidding candidates with similar names to run for office lest those stupid, stupid voters get “confused.”
The other part of DOJ’s argument is that Daniel J. Sullivan’s candidacy is a Democratic Party dirty trick designed to produce exactly the “confusion” in question. So I guess they’re claiming that Democrats think Alaskans are stupid, too.
Three big problems with DOJ’s case: There’s no law against voter stupidity, nor is there any law against similarly named candidates seeking the same office, nor are there any laws against political dirty tricks as such. I’m not a lawyer, but so far as I can tell there’s just no legal basis for the suit. It’s DOJ plaintively whining “give us what we want, because we want it.”
A fourth problem is that the problem isn’t a problem: Alaska uses ranked-choice voting.
Instead of voting for one, and only one, candidate, Alaskans “rank” the candidates in order of preference. If your first choice gets the fewest votes, your vote moves to your second choice in a second (theoretically instant) round of vote-counting. If THAT candidate gets the fewest votes, your vote moves to your third choice. This goes on until one candidate gets a majority of votes.
As Greg Orman points out at RealClearPolitics, this particular situation tends to benefit that Republican incumbent.
Some voters want to vote for the Republican incumbent and either know or can figure out who that Republican incumbent is by, you know, READING THE BALLOT. They’ll rank Daniel S. Sullivan first, and may or may not pick a second choice at all.
“Confused” voters who want to vote for the Republican incumbent and have problems READING THE BALLOT will likely rank the two Sullivans first and second just to be sure (unless they’re “confused” by Heikes’s Republican designation). In a second round, the more popular Sullivan will likely get the less popular Sullivan’s votes. It’s a safe bet that word has gotten around enough for the incumbent to outpoll the challenger as first choice.
“Problem” solved. Daniel S. Sullivan likely loses this election only if he’s less popular with voters than Mary Peltola.
Frivolous lawfare shenanigans like this go a long way toward achieving precisely that outcome. Even if Daniel S. Sullivan didn’t personally ask DOJ to publicly claim — right before an election! — that Alaska’s voters are too stupid to have their votes count, those voters are likely to notice the insult, and on whose behalf it was levied.
Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.
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