Yesterday, The New York Times threw a wrench in the works. It reported that Dan J. was not happily living in his quiet fishing village reading books about fish and tending to his garden when he suddenly decided to run for the Senate. Nope. In fact, Peltola's team combed through voting lists to find all the Dan Sullivans in the state and then carefully selected Dan J. and helped him get on the ballot. This sort of trickery is actually not unusual. Other candidates have been doing this kind of stuff for years. The question is whether it will affect the election. Republicans who were planning to vote for Dan S. will still do so. The big unknown is are there many Peltola voters who will be disgusted by this trick and switch to Dan S. The disclosure may not be fatal, though, because: (1) not all Alaskans will even know about this before they vote, (2) some Alaskans have already voted, and (3) some people who like Peltola will admire her cleverness for pulling this off.
The revelation could possibly affect the lawsuit, but probably not. Parties often recruit candidates. In primaries, it is not unusual for parties to (financially) support someone on the other team who they think would be a weak general-election opponent. This kind of stuff is actually the original use of the thing we call rodent reproduction. Republicans did it this year in a couple of Democratic House primaries, for example. It is scuzzy, but perfectly legal, to contribute to a candidate who you think is a weak opponent to your candidate. In fact, there have been many primaries where a Democrat switched his or her registration to Republican in order to vote for a crazy fringe candidate, and vice versa. Nevertheless, this development is not going to help Peltola. (V)
The NYT report mentioned is the one linked in the sibling comment.
https://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2026/Items/Oct29-5.html
It ends with:
The NYT report mentioned is the one linked in the sibling comment.