Attorney General Todd Blanche spent Sunday morning defending a federal lawsuit, which The Guardian called unprecedented, asking that Alaska be barred from certifying its U.S. Senate result if Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan loses his race against Democrat Mary Peltola, a former congresswoman.
The Justice Department says the problem is a name. A second candidate on the Nov. 3 ballot, Daniel J. Sullivan, is a retired schoolteacher from Petersburg, and the department argues the overlap could leave voters confused. Critics, including some Democrats, see something else in the case: an effort to interfere with the vote in a seat Republicans regard as crucial to holding the Senate for the back half of Trump's term.
A heated Sunday on CNN
On CNN's State of the Union, host Dana Bash asked whether the suit was setting the stage for Trump to contest an outcome he dislikes, and whether that could lead somewhere like the aftermath of Jan. 6. Blanche rejected the premise, told Bash she was not being a real person and called the suggestion crazy. He denied that the department was preparing the ground for the president, saying the case concerned Alaska and whether state law had been broken, and that any dispute would ultimately be settled by Alaska and its courts.
Blanche was also combative on CBS's Face the Nation, where he accused host Margaret Brennan of misleading viewers in her summary of the litigation after she asked whether Trump had directed the filing.
Trump has already answered that question himself. Asked about the suit by reporters in Florida on Friday, he said: "I'm the one that said do it."
What the suit asks for
Filed late Thursday in federal court in Alaska, the complaint invokes the National Voter Registration Act and seeks to hold off certification after the election until the government has looked into whether ballots cast for Daniel J. Sullivan were really meant for the senator, NPR reported. The department has not explained how it could make that determination given that ballots are secret. The filing was signed by Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward, who before joining the department represented several people accused of taking part in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
Alaska has already litigated the question. Republican election officials tried to remove Daniel J. Sullivan from the ballot, arguing he was running to mislead voters, but a state court and the Alaska Supreme Court kept him on. He has said the decision to run was his own and denied trying to confuse anyone or pull votes from the incumbent. Blanche said the state ruling did not consider federal law.
The state has also separated the two men on the ballot itself. The senator is listed as Dan S. Sullivan with a Republican label and an incumbent marker, while Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. appears without a party label. In the August primary, the senator drew more than 68,000 votes; his namesake received 4,107. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Alaska's other Republican senator and a supporter of Sullivan's reelection, said on social media that the department should not have sued.
Experts see little chance in court
Election law specialists have been blunt. Derek Mueller, a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, wrote that the claim had essentially no likelihood of success. David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation & Research, described the suit as an unprecedented federal intervention that raises concerns about political interference, coming 11 days before polls close. New York University law professor Richard H. Pildes told The New York Times it was among the weakest election lawsuits he had seen.
What happens next turns on the count. If Sullivan wins, the suit may never matter. If Peltola wins, Alaskans will find out whether a federal court is willing to let the Justice Department stand between their votes and a certified result.
Reporting sources: US politics | The Guardian, “Blanche defends DoJ’s pre-emptive suit to block Alaska Senate results certification” · NPR Topics: Politics, “Blanche defends DOJ lawsuit blocking Alaska Senate results if Republican loses”.