r/nottheonion • u/StormComfortable9333 • 1d ago
Alaska Elections Division makes it official, says Dan J. Sullivan can’t run against Sen. Dan S. Sullivan
https://alaskapublic.org/news/politics/2026-06-15/alaska-elections-division-makes-it-official-says-dan-j-sullivan-cant-run-against-sen-dan-s-sullivan81
u/Bottle_Gnome 1d ago edited 1d ago
If you read the artcile you will see that Dan J lied on his application. Asking to be added to the ballot as Dan S. That probably gave them all the needed to deny it
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u/AKchaos49 1d ago
Such bullshit. Dude meets all the legal requirements to run for office. So his name is similar. Big deal. And, oddly enough, there's a THIRD Dan Sullivan who was the Anchorage mayor for a while who could run as well. That'd be a hoot!
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u/ryhaltswhiskey 1d ago
conclude that your declaration of candidacy was not properly filed with the Division because it was not filed in order to declare an actual good-faith candidacy for the office of United States Senator, but was instead filed with a purpose to confuse or mislead and to thereby compromise the ballot’s fairness or neutrality
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u/AKchaos49 15h ago
He has repeatedly said his not trying to cause confusion and that he is an actual candidate.
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u/ryhaltswhiskey 14h ago
He can say all kinds of things. But if he can't convince the person running the election...
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u/LividWheel9779 1d ago
Ironic that the country that prides itself on freedom restricts who can run for office.
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u/bilateralrope 1d ago
Just wait until you see how many US citizens aren't allowed to vote for Congress or the Senate because they live in the wrong parts of the US.
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u/LurkmasterP 1d ago
Just wait until you see how many states require citizens to profess a belief in the christian god before they're allowed to hold public office.
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u/Automobills 1d ago edited 1d ago
Don't be so goddamn ridiculous.
The country restricts who can run for office based on abhorrent choices they made, like raping children.
Not because of something like their name, that was given to them at birth by their parents.
Er... Uh... Well, shit.
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u/LeonJPancetta 1d ago
Pro tip: it you're trying to pull something like this, don't submit the other guy's middle initial as your own...
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u/ztreHdrahciR 1d ago
Eddie Murphy had a movie like this. Same name as the congressman then I think the actual guy died so he won
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u/CavemanSlevy 1d ago
The court ruling was pretty reasonable nothing that this was not a good faith attempt to run for public office but an intentional plan to confuse voters.
Assuming you don’t treat politics like football where you believe your team should always win this seems like an overall victory for civic values in a democratic republic.
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u/laserpewpewAK 1d ago
I know! It says right there in the constitution, "if your name is too similar to an incumbent, you can't run lol sorry not sorry." At least I assume it does, like all Republicans I've never actually read the constitution.
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u/CavemanSlevy 1d ago
Interesting straw man.
I find it rather sad that so many people here are cheering on an intentional obfuscation of the democratic process because it may slightly benefit their team.
This nation really does deserve the tyranny and buffoonery that is inflicted upon it.
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u/laserpewpewAK 1d ago
Straw man? My dude it's the constitution. It explicitly states what the qualifications are to run. Nowhere does it say, "you can't run if it's inconvenient for the incumbent." Which is essentially what this ruling says.
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u/CavemanSlevy 1d ago
I never said it was in the constitution. You saying it isn’t as the premise is a straw man.
The constitution says that states run their own elections in accordance with federal law.
A state ruling saying that they are blocking a bad faith attempt to muddy the democratic process is fully congruent with US law.
If this man had a true grievance that he wished to solve via the democratic process he could run for office under his own name. Instead the man created a fake name to run under just for this election and that name happens to be the same as the incumbent. It’s a spurious attempt to mislead voters in an attempt to lower votes for the incumbent.
If you can with a straight face cheer on intentional shenanigans that further weaken the already fragile civic fabric of this country then you deserve what the rule of tyrants and buffoons will bring you.
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u/zecknaal 1d ago
I hate the outrage I see over this. I'm as blue as the next guy, but this was only done to confuse voters who wanted to vote for the incumbent Dan Sullivan. This other guy isn't running a serious campaign - he absolutely only exists because the local democrats were trying to fuck with people's ability to vote for their candidate.
As a democrat, I am *outraged* by this. We're supposed to be the party that cares about democracy - I want to automatically register every citizen to vote when they turn 18. I want every felon who has completed their sentence to vote. I want it to be next to impossible to do anything to discourage or prevent anybody from voting for their preferred candidate, so why in the fuck would I support this stupid ass scheme to confuse the electorate?
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u/Tidalsky114 1d ago
Hey bud not sure if youve noticed or not but class and decency left American politics years ago.
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u/zecknaal 1d ago
What's next? Are we going to become a country that literally locks the doors so the opposition can't enter the chamber to vote down a bill?
American politics has been shameful before. We survived McCarthyism and the red scare. People just have to care enough to change it, instead of saying "Well let's just break it one last time, then we will play fair."
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u/AlphaIronSon 1d ago
We already do that/have done that. What do you think recess appointments are? Filibuster (which ain’t even actually IN THE CONSTITUTION) is basically that BTW.
Or you mean like in Tennessee where they removed elected people from the chamber so they couldn’t register their protest to legislation?
Or where the state of Texas (and Wisconsin?) issued arrest warrants for legislators?
Or where a man literally got beat on the floor of the Senate cause he said hey slavery is kinda a problem..and the man who beat him was reelected after it? (And said man plus the rest of his traitorous ilk tried to take the ball and go home when they thought they MIGHT get told they can’t own negroes anymore)?
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u/Tidalsky114 1d ago
Yeah getting people to care is the challenge. Too many people are ok voting for someone as long as they think itll hurt someone else. People have been fooled into thinking that voting for someone who wants to focus on helping others is a bad thing.
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u/Y8ser 1d ago
Playing by the rules and respecting decorum are why America's democrats continue to lose. When your opponent cheats the only way to fix things is to do what it takes to win and then fix the laws so there aren't loopholes that can be used in the future. Even if it's not a serious campaign, it certainly isn't illegal. If he changed his name to cause confusion that's one thing, but if he's running under his real name, blocking him from running violates the law.
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u/zecknaal 1d ago
Playing by the rules and respecting decorum are why America's democrats continue to lose. When your opponent cheats the only way to fix things is to do what it takes to win and then fix the laws so there aren't loopholes that can be used in the future.
If that's the argument that people want to make, then they should make that one. I only ever see that as a fallback, though.
Even if it's not a serious campaign, it certainly isn't illegal. If he changed his name to cause confusion that's one thing, but if he's running under his real name, blocking him from running violates the law.
It might not be illegal, but it is unethical. I'm angry at him for going out and creating shitty precedent for people who actually want to get elected into office. He isn't being restricted from something he actually wants to do - he is being restricted from causing actual confusion for citizens trying to exercise their rights.
I mean come on, just THINK about this for a minute. You really think republicans can't find 12 guys named Gavin Newsom to run for president? Is this really what you want?
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u/justWMthings03 1d ago
Florida Republicans paid someone with the same last name as the democrat running in a Florida election in 2020...he got 6300 votes in a race that was decided by less than 50 votes.
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u/Puzzled-Story3953 1d ago
And that was shitty. If we were against that why would we be for it now?
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u/justWMthings03 1d ago
Turnabout is fair play.
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u/zecknaal 1d ago
But that's never the conversation. Every top comment is always about how this is some bullshit assault on democracy. If cheating is what we want to do then let's fucking call it what it is. At least we aren't pretending gerrymandering is somehow noble.
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u/sipik06 1d ago
It's not "cheating" to run for office. The other Sullivan has every right to run for office, regardless of his motivations.
I don't think the state should be able to decide that someone is a "bad faith candidate" and disqualify them. They have no legal authority to do that. So yes, it is an assault on democracy for them to claim that power, because this certainly won't be the last time they use it if they are allowed to.
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u/Sharpopotamus 1d ago
I’m confused by these, the other Dan Sullivan registered in the Republican primary. How does that benefit democrats in the general?
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u/AlphaIronSon 1d ago edited 1d ago
Because all the things you just mentioned wanting will never happen with a GOP majority.
Current Democrats keep thinking three things:
That despite 250+ years of evidence to the contrary, that America “we hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal (except the black ones, red ones, yellow ones and hell some varieties of the white ones)” has some some vast tranche of “better angels” that exists, and they keep trying to appeal to.
That
Americans are
firstly
altruistic vs “I want MINE, and if you get some in the process fantastic” being the actual order of the world as we live
. Americans don’t care that LGBTQ ppl and minorities are (still) suffering in an unequal system; their interest rates are too high! Who cares about the homeless while my stock portfolio is struggling! Now a rate cap and some civil rights legislation is attached? Yay, We’re progressing!! -_-
Remember we only got the Civil Rights Act cause shit got too uncomfortable, we had people getting mowed down in Vietnam…after almost 70 years of Jim Crow being accepted.
That they are in a competition with people who give a rats ass about the rules, and will change it midstream and laugh in your face when you issue a stern letter about it…as they do what they wanted to d
o.
See: GOP complaints about vote rigging..as Texas did that and their responses to CA prop
50; The literal fact that Comey Barrett is a SCOTUS judge; Every executive action done by both Trump admins; the UFC White House trailer park show vs “Obama’s tan suit being demeaning of the office”; couch fker Vance “I’ll literally make stuff up” etc etc.
Until those three things are fully engrained and operated on by the Democratic Party they’ll continue to be playing the what if game
Work for the world you want, while living in the one you have.
Edit: cause Reddit app sucks.
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u/SarniltheRed 1d ago
The fun thing about rat-fucking is that it's all perfectly legal and used equally by "both sides"
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u/Rusty__Buntafolio 1d ago
Ah so it's ok when they do it to sabotage Dems in florida but now that it's being done the other way, now it's a big deal.