(by Kellen Browning, NY Times) – In the summer of 2025, a staffer for Mary Peltola, the Alaska Democrat who was eyeing a run for Senate, received unusual instructions from top campaign aides: Find as many people named Dan Sullivan in Alaska as you can.

The staffer complied, combing through voter records to produce a list of Dan Sullivans from across the state.

This was no random request. Dan S. Sullivan is the name of the state’s Republican senator. And if the Peltola campaign or its allies could track down and persuade another Dan Sullivan to run for Senate, the confusion could cost the senator crucial votes on the state’s unusual, four-person ballot (see “Background” below for explanation).

The plan worked. This spring, a retired teacher from a tiny fishing village along the Alaska Panhandle, reachable only by air and sea, announced his candidacy for Senate. His name was Dan J. Sullivan.

The endeavor, which was internally called the Ballot Composition Project [by the Peltola campaign] involved secret trips to far-flung Alaskan communities and the appearance of a mysterious Midwestern operative, who traversed the state using a fake name and made his pitch to would-be candidates over beers at [bars].

It also involved the Peltola campaign’s lawyers, as well as senior aides at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee [DSCC], which directs the party’s campaign strategy in Senate races across the country. From Washington to Anchorage, those advisers participated in regular conversations about the effort and even considered forming a new political party to draw conservatives onto the ballot.

Ballot-stacking tactics are common in politics and generally considered legal — and have been employed by both parties in Alaska. [When Ms. Peltola ran for re-election to the House two years ago, the state Republican Party backed an effort to help a Democrat — an inmate who ran his campaign from a New York prison — stay on the ballot. They did not do so secretly, but publicly supported keeping him on the 2024 U.S. House ballot; it was not a covert recruitment or campaign-backing effort.].

But [the Peltola] operation, which has not been reported before, reveals the lengths to which Democrats went to seek advantage in a Senate race that could determine control of the chamber.

“Alaskan voters need to know,” said Elisa Rios, Ms. Peltola’s former campaign manager and longtime aide, who was fired amid a staff shake-up in August, and agreed to a series of interviews with The Times since then. “There was a lot of speculation, and voters should get the full picture when making their decisions.”

Ms. Peltola was not directly involved in the project, Ms. Rios said, but she was “definitely aware.”

The operation [to confuse Republican voters by diluting Republican votes] had impact. On Tuesday, Ms. Peltola will be the only Democrat on the ballot, facing off against the two Mr. Sullivans and a long-shot [Republican] candidate named Gerald Heikes who was also recruited into the race, according to The Times’s reporting. Polls give Ms. Peltola a strong chance of winning. …

This article is based on interviews over the past two months with 12 people who participated in or were told of the plan, or were would-be candidates that the team tried to recruit. The Times also obtained dozens of text messages that provided updates on the progress of the effort. The reporting included the extensive interviews with Ms. Rios, during which she shared details of the operation.

Last week, as The Times prepared to publish this article, Ms. Rios, who had been planning to file a wrongful termination lawsuit against the Peltola campaign, contacted The Times and said she wanted to take back her previous statements.

“As discussed on our call earlier today, I am confirming that I have retracted all statements made regarding the 2026 Alaska Senate Race in connection with any article you may or may not be writing,” Ms. Rios wrote. “I am not willing to be a source for any story in any capacity.”

This year, as soon as Mr. Sullivan entered the race, Republicans denounced him as a Democratic plant, but they haven’t been able to prove it. They attempted to remove him from the ballot, arguing that he was not a “good faith” candidate and citing his registration switch from unaffiliated to Republican just before the deadline to run.

In June [months before this article exposed the truth], the Alaska Supreme Court brushed aside that argument, ruling there was no basis for removing Mr. Sullivan in either state law or the U.S. Constitution.

A lawsuit from the Justice Department [seeking to block certification of the election results if votes for the other Mr. Sullivan cost Senator Sullivan the win] is still making its way through the court. Election law experts say the case is dubious, given that states control the administration of elections under the Constitution, and the suit seeks to challenge an election that hasn’t happened yet.

The team’s spirits rose with the results of the Aug. 18 primary, as both Dan Sullivans advanced to the four-way general election. But there was one problem: The fourth spot on the ballot had gone to a Democrat who could siphon some votes away from Ms. Peltola that fall.

That Democrat, a progressive named David Leslie, quickly faced calls from his party to withdraw. One of those callers, Mr. Leslie said in an interview, was Jerid Kurtz. Mr. Kurtz met with Mr. Leslie in person, at a cafe in Fairbanks, according to a person familiar with the exchange.

Mr. Leslie soon agreed to drop out.

“I’m really proud of the action you took today,” Mr. Kurtz wrote to Mr. Leslie on Aug. 31, the day he dropped out, in a text message viewed by The Times.

Mr. Leslie’s exit cleared the way for another Republican to take his spot on the ballot, potentially dividing the G.O.P. vote even further: Gerald Heikes.

Mr. Heikes, a drywall contractor, said in an interview that he was recruited to run for Senate this spring “by a guy from the Midwest.” The man, whose name Mr. Heikes did not remember, first reached him on the phone, then met with him at a deli in his hometown of Palmer, Alaska. Mr. Heikes did not think he resembled the photo of Mr. Kurtz.

Nathaniel Herz contributed reporting from Alaska, and Matt Zdun, Theodore Schleifer, Emily Davies and Beth Reinhard contributed reporting from New York and Washington. Georgia Gee and Julie Tate contributed research.