“That’s Part of the Process”: Democratic Leaders Embrace Voter Confusion Tactics as Harmless or Humorous

In his work “Politics and the English Language,” George Orwell explains that “In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.”  If so, the news this week took a truly Orwellian turn as Democrats rationalized or even praised the effort in Alaska to put a decoy “Dan Sullivan” on the ballot to confuse Alaskans and cause mistaken votes. Other Democratic politicians are entirely silent on the allegation that the campaign of Democratic candidate Mary Peltola engineered this grossly unethical tactic. The very same people running on “saving Democracy” are, once again, defending ballot manipulation designed to negate the votes of citizens. It is the ultimate expression of rage politics, excusing any act needed to achieve power.

On NewsNation Now, Rep. Suhas Subramanyam (D-VA) went beyond many of his colleagues in saying that the Alaskan scandal shows precisely where all states, including Virginia, should go. When asked about the scandal, Subramanyam insisted that it showed how all states should embrace the widely criticized ranked-choice voting system. (Alaskans may finally reject the system this year). While asked about the use of a decoy candidate, Subramanyam bizarrely spun the question as third-party candidates — a bizarre claim since the fake Dan Sullivan has not campaigned, has never run for office, and is obviously on the ballot solely to confuse voters.

Nevertheless, Subramanyam insisted, while he would not run a decoy, “I also don’t have a ranked-choice voting system in Virginia. I wish I did, honestly. But, in Alaska, they have ranked-choice voting, and third-party candidates are very relevant. And so, if you recruited a third-party candidate who can take votes away from your opponent, that’s part of the process, and that’s just how it works in Alaska.” Previously, Subramanyam also supported the most radical gerrymandering effort in the nation (which was later struck down as unlawful).

Sen. Chris Murphy (D., Conn.) seemed to snowball as he tried to rationalize the move. He first attempted to blame it on one woman who was a “disgruntled former employee.” When CNN host Kaitlan Collins noted that The New York Times was relying on a large number of sources in the Peltola campaign, Murphy said it wouldn’t bother him at all to have decoys on his ballot because no one would be confused when voting. Of course, the entire reason you put another Dan Sullivan on the ballot is to confuse voters and cause citizens to throw away their votes on the wrong man. In a close election, that can easily make the difference in the outcome of the election. Murphy also praised the Peltola campaign and said he “trusts” them, despite the New York Times saying they actively sought to cause such voting errors.

In 2025, Murphy appeared on any cable show that would have him to declare that “those of us who believe that the threat to democracy is urgent” need to “act like it.”

Most Democratic leaders refused to say anything at all in the face of an open effort to nullify votes through candidate confusion.

Pundits and party officials have dismissed the scandal as brass-knuckles politics or even as humorous. The head of Alaska’s Democratic Party, Eric Croft, insisted that the sole consideration is whether it is a crime, not whether it is unethical: “I reread all of Alaska’s statutes. I’m kind of a recovering attorney up here. And there is nothing, there’s no legal issue to it. On your, you know, sort of dirty tricks thing, I think Alaskans have a different take there too.”

When pressed whether it is a good thing to try to confuse Alaskan voters and nullify their votes, Croft responded “No, I think it’s funny.”

That knee-slapper involves a politician and campaign that allegedly lied to the public about their involvement. It involves a decoy who is also accused of lying when he said he had no interaction with third parties and did not enter the race to confuse voters. (Notably, the decoy, when asked by the Division of Elections how his name should appear on the ballot, reportedly asked to use “S” as a middle initial (like the senator) as opposed to his own initial of “J.” ).

One would think that this would be an easy question for candidates who insist that they are defenders of democracy. However, in 2024, Democrats moved to remove Trump and other Republicans from ballots while claiming to be protecting voters by denying them the choice of candidates. The fact that the voters gave Trump the popular vote and swept every swing state only magnified the hypocrisy of these Democratic leaders. Yet, some of the same figures are back at it again with efforts to manipulate balloting to confuse or nullify votes in the name of protecting democracy.

Some of the same figures, such as Marc Elias, have reappeared in yet another election scandal. The Elias Law Group was named by the New York Times as involved in the controversy. Elias was a central figure in the Russian hoax as the campaign lawyer for Hillary Clinton. The Federal Election Commission (FEC) fined the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for violating election rules in hiding the funding for the infamous Steele dossier. Before the election, Clinton officials denied any such involvement.

In an age of rage, consistency, like decency, is a stranger to politics. We are left again in that moment with lawyer Joseph Welch in the Army-McCarthy hearings in 1954: “Have you no shame, sir, at long last? Have you no shame?” The answer today is clear: No, but I have the votes.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the New York Times best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”