President Donald Trump said Friday that he told the Justice Department to file a lawsuit seeking to block certification of the U.S. Senate race in Alaska if Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan loses. He made the remarks as he landed in Florida for a campaign rally.
The suit, filed late Thursday in federal court in Alaska, targets a second candidate named Dan Sullivan. Daniel J. Sullivan, a resident of the fishing community of Petersburg, says he is running on his own. Republicans contend he is a Democratic plant meant to draw votes from the incumbent. The senator is expected to face Democrat Mary Peltola, the state’s former congresswoman, in a close race.
The government asks that Alaska be barred from certifying a Peltola win while Daniel J. Sullivan remains on the ballot. The filing came 11 days before the Nov. 3 election. The Alaska Supreme Court has already rejected an earlier Republican effort to remove him.
Peltola called the lawsuit “flagrant corruption” at a forum in Anchorage. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican, said the state had already distinguished the candidates on the ballot and that the Justice Department “should never have filed this lawsuit.”
Legal experts doubt the case will hold. Derek Muller, a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, said federal law does not let the department block certification and that a court will likely dismiss it. The U.S. Constitution leaves the running of elections to the states.
The case adds to concerns that the administration could try to block certification of races its party loses, a fear Democrats and voting rights advocates have voiced for years. Alaska’s ranked choice system means a winner may not be known for weeks.
The Sullivan campaign said the court process should run its course.
