The second Dan Sullivan: reported recruiting, no proven crime

The Times reports that Peltola campaign aides and an operative introduced by the DSCC secretly recruited spoilers, this Sullivan included. No investigation has found it yet. The campaign, the DSCC and Sullivan deny it.

The Times based its story on interviews with 12 people and dozens of text messages¹. Its account of this Sullivan leans on Elisa Rios, Peltola's fired campaign manager. She says operative Jerid Kurtz told the team he had found a Sullivan willing to run if it would help Peltola, who she says was not directly involved but "definitely aware." Rios tried to retract last week. The Times says her account matched its other reporting, and another person confirmed Kurtz's call from Petersburg¹.

David Leslie, a Fairbanks Democrat, says Kurtz was among those who urged him to drop out, and called it "only one of the reasons" he did^1,2. Alaska's News Source and Alaska Public Media say they haven't independently confirmed the Times' account^3,4. Sullivan says he entered the race on his own and has denied talking with Peltola's campaign^1,5.

A popular post on the left overstates it the other way. Justin Baragona wrote that Rios "is now suing" the campaign⁶. The Times says she "had been planning to file" a suit¹.

No one has pointed to an Alaska or federal law that recruiting a candidate breaks, namesake or not. The Times calls ballot-stacking "generally considered legal." Whether money behind the effort broke campaign-finance law is an open question.

Alaska's sworn candidate declaration asks for name, residency, party, age and citizenship. It doesn't ask why someone is running⁷. In June the state tried to remove this Sullivan as a candidate not running in good faith. A judge restored him, and the Alaska Supreme Court affirmed⁸. Election-law scholar Rick Hasen, writing about the candidate, said he doesn't see how the government "could criminalize" running for office with impure motives⁹.

How recruiting is paid for can be a crime. Florida's 2020 ghost-candidate case ended in convictions for conspiracy, illegal campaign contributions and false swearing¹⁰. The Times found a pro-Peltola super PAC paid a firm co-owned by Kurtz about $87,000. The PAC says it never paid him for any services¹. Gov. Dunleavy has ordered a state investigation¹¹. No one has been charged.

A widely shared post on the left said the judge in DOJ's suit to block certification had "fast-tracked it for DISMISSAL"¹². She had only sped up the schedule then¹³. She dismissed the suit Nov. 1 for lack of standing¹⁴.

The campaign's denial in DOJ's case is an unsworn answer from its lawyers, saying it lacks knowledge of why Sullivan is running. No one from the campaign or the DSCC has testified. Perjury requires a false statement under oath.

The campaign and the DSCC joined DOJ's lawsuit on Oct. 28¹⁵. Their proposed answer, filed Oct. 23 and signed only by their lawyers, says they "lack knowledge or information sufficient to form a belief" about DOJ's claim that Sullivan's candidacy exists to help Peltola, "and therefore deny" it¹⁶. Federal rules say a pleading "need not be verified"¹⁷. A written statement carries perjury risk when it's signed "under penalty of perjury"¹⁸.

Their emergency motion says an attached declaration from their lawyers lays out the need for speed¹⁹. We haven't seen it. DOJ said it would seek discovery, including on whether the campaign "attempted to deceive the Court by seeking an expedited ruling" while it "may have been aware of the New York Times reporting"²⁰. It was denied as moot¹⁴. No court has found any filing false.

In June, Dan J. Sullivan denied it in a letter to Lt. Gov. Nancy Dahlstrom's office that Alaska's News Source called his "sworn response": "I have had no conversations whatsoever with the Peltola campaign about my candidacy"⁵.