The Justice Department on Friday acknowledged that its investigation into Democrats who recruited a decoy candidate to run in the Alaska Senate race may never yield criminal charges, defending an inquiry that critics dismissed as a political stunt in the lead-up to Election Day. Heyman, the U.S. attorney for Alaska, told reporters during a news conference in Anchorage that his office had spent the past few months quietly investigating whether Democratic operatives violated federal laws in recruiting a candidate with the same name to oppose the Republican incumbent, Senator Dan S. Heyman said the inquiry kicked into high gear after The New York Times reported that aides to Mary Peltola, Mr.
Sullivan’s Democratic opponent, helped enlist the other candidate, Dan J. But he declined to say what crimes — if any — were being investigated. A sample election ballot in Anchorage, Alaska on Oct. 29, 2026.Credit...Eloise Brethes/ via Mr.
Heyman said his office was acting in good faith to protect the integrity of the election. He added that he was working closely with the F.B.I. in the state and around the country. But he struggled to explain why the report by The Times appears to have resulted in the expansion of the investigation, or why he made the announcement days before a hotly disputed election.
It is unclear what jurisdiction federal prosecutors have in the Alaska case, although officials in Washington have suggested it could be predicated on the existence of an as-yet-unspecified criminal conspiracy. Karen Loeffler, a veteran prosecutor who served as Alaska’s U.S. attorney from 2009 to 2017, questioned the value of a criminal investigation. It may bother some people.
But recruiting people you think will take votes away from somebody isn’t even unusual,” she added. It makes very clear that there is incumbent senator Dan Sullivan and this other guy.” Last week, the Trump administration asked a federal court to block the certification of the election in Alaska if Mr. Sullivan narrowly lost, the first time the Justice Department had sought to preemptively intervene in an election since the late 1960s.
In filings Friday, administration lawyers sought to force election workers to “preserve and segregate all ballots ranking Daniel J. Sullivan” in case of a future investigation. It is not clear how or if the state elections division would do that.
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