{"id":944652,"date":"2026-10-29T02:42:17","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T02:42:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/944652\/"},"modified":"2026-10-29T02:42:17","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T02:42:17","slug":"trump-demands-mary-peltola-be-prosecuted-over-same-name-election-confusion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/944652\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump demands Mary Peltola be prosecuted over same-name election confusion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Donald Trump<\/a> has called for a Democratic politician to be prosecuted over reports her campaign talked a man with the same name as her opponent to also run in the election.<\/p>\n

Dan J Sullivan filed to run in the Senate election in Alaska<\/a> as a Republican against incumbent Senator Dan S Sullivan<\/a>, also a Republican.<\/p>\n

\"Mary<\/p>\n

Mary Peltola, whose campaign catchcry is \u201cFish, family, freedom\u201d, is neck-and-neck in the polls with Dan Sullivan.\u00a0AP Photo\/Becky Bohrer<\/p>\n

Now the New York Times has reported that staffers on Democratic candidate Mary Peltola<\/a>\u2019s team were involved in recruiting the second Sullivan into the race.<\/p>\n

Peltola has denied the accusations.<\/p>\n

“The Alaskans for Mary campaign has no involvement with either Sullivan campaign,” her campaign said in a statement.<\/p>\n

“Like Mary, our campaign is focused on lowering costs and fixing the rigged system in DC.”<\/p>\n

Trump raged at Peltola in a series of posts on Truth Social<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“Mary Peltola should suffer the Legal and Political consequences for what she has done, A FRAUD ON THE AMERICAN PUBLIC, and Dan Sullivan should be allowed to run without either Mary Peltola or FAKE Dan Sullivan on the Ballot,” the president wrote.<\/p>\n

“Mary Peltola, should be removed from the Ballot and prosecuted \u2014 So should the FAKE Dan Sullivan. Nothing else will do!”<\/p>\n

The other Sullivan, a former primary school teacher, said he is running for office for his own reasons and denied he was pushed to run by the Democrats.<\/p>\n

\"President<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump talks with Sen. Dan Sullivan at a campaign event earlier this month.\u00a0AP Photo\/Alex Brandon<\/p>\n

The Trump administration has skirted around questions about whether any laws were broken.<\/p>\n

“If it’s cheating, if it’s fraud, is it illegal? The answer is it certainly should be,” Attorney-General Todd Blanche said.<\/p>\n

It is not a crime to run for office when you have the same name as a sitting politician, nor is it a crime to suggest someone do so.<\/p>\n

Alaska has a complicated voting system different from most other states.<\/p>\n

Every candidate from every party runs on the same ballot in a primary election.<\/p>\n

The top-four vote getters then run in a general election, with Alaskans able to number their preferences in a way similar to Australian ballots.<\/p>\n

So while there are two Dan Sullivans on the ballot in the November midterm election, if voters preference either above Peltola, it will go to Sullivan.<\/p>\n

The Department of Justice has sued the state of Alaska to stop the state certifying election results, but only if Senator Sullivan does not win.<\/p>\n

Trump himself said he demanded the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

“I’m the one that said do it,” the president said.<\/p>\n

“The Democrats put up a guy who never voted before. All of sudden he decides to run for the Senate.”<\/p>\n

Polling this month shows Peltola has a narrow lead in the election, with the second Sullivan polling in the low single digits.<\/p>\n

\"Dan<\/p>\n

Dan Sullivan (left) and Dan Sullivan (right) are both Republicans running for Senate in Alaska.\u00a0AP Photo\/Mark Thiessen; Becky Bohrer<\/p>\n

The state is typically Republican-leaning, but Peltola has established herself as an independent-minded populist with a platform of “Fish, family and freedom”.<\/p>\n

The Alaska seat could be critical in determining which party controls the Senate after November’s midterm elections.<\/p>\n

More than 60,000 people in the immense but sparsely populated state have already cast their ballot.<\/p>\n

The New York Times\u2019 allegations today stem largely from interviews with former campaign manager Elisa Rios, who was fired by Peltola in August.<\/p>\n

Last week Rios told the Times she retracted her statements and was not willing to be a source. The Times did not comply with her demand.<\/p>\n

Election Day is next Tuesday, November 3.\u00a0<\/p>\n

nine.com.au<\/a> will be running a live blog covering election results as they come in on Wednesday Australian time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Donald Trump has called for a Democratic politician to be prosecuted over reports her campaign talked a man…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":944653,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-944652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/944652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=944652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/944652\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/944653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=944652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=944652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=944652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}