How Democrats are pulling a fast one over Alaska Republicans

I know because I was there just a few weeks ago, and I saw it for myself.Democratic Party leaders regularly and loudly thump their chests over what they call a “core principle” of their party, “to maximize voter participation for all Americans,” as their national platform declares. They claim this is because “Democrats believe we must make it easier to vote, not harder.” That reasoning falls flat in Alaska. That’s because in this year’s contest for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-AK), Democratic Party leaders are trying to maximize their party’s candidate’s chances for victory under the guise of trying to maximize voter participation.Instead of making it easier to vote, they’re relying on a confusing method of casting and counting ballots called ranked choice voting. In this voting scheme, voters don’t just cast a single ballot for their favored candidate, and then the candidate with the most votes wins. Instead, voters cast a ballot on which they have ranked their multiple choices in numerical order, and then — as in a special Election Day edition of Survivor — the low-man on each successive round of counting ballots is dropped, and his votes are reallocated to the voters’ next-favored choices until one candidate emerges with a majority.This system isn’t just complicated. It’s confusing. Consequently, it can result in a reduction in voter participation, the exact opposite of what Democrats claim they want.And just in case that level of confusion doesn’t generate their desired electoral outcome, Democrats have a backup plan to throw even more sand in the voters’ eyes: Democratic Party operatives have recruited and are running a candidate with the same first and last name as the candidate they are desperate to defeat.Daniel S. Sullivan (30-year U.S. Air Force veteran, two-term incumbent senator), meet Daniel J. Sullivan (retired elementary school teacher who joined the GOP two days before filing his candidacy paperwork).This scheme was so obviously intended to sow confusion that the state’s Division of Elections director disqualified Daniel J. Sullivan from the ballot just days after he filed. He was restored to the ballot by a ruling from the state’s Supreme Court.Clearly, the Democratic operatives who helped the challenger launch his campaign think that in a close race, the loss of a few thousand or perhaps even just a few hundred votes could deny the incumbent a first-ballot majority and lead to their desired outcome.Daniel J. Sullivan’s campaign might not violate the law, but that does not make it right.Why the need for the subterfuge? Because Alaska’s electoral history shows that it is, for all intents and purposes, a ruby red state.Since 1974, Democrats have won a contest for the U.S. Senate in Alaska precisely once (and that was when the incumbent was convicted of federal corruption charges eight days before the election, and even then he lost by fewer than 4,000 votes). And at the presidential level, the state is even redder — Alaska has voted for the Republican candidate for president in 16 of the 17 elections held since the state joined the union.Faced with the perpetual difficulty of winning statewide, Democrats tried a new tack: They changed the rules. They imported millions of dollars from progressive donors in the Lower 48 in 2020 to win a ballot initiative to impose ranked choice voting on the state.The state’s first use of the system in August 2022 was so confusing to voters that opponents of the ranked choice system were able to qualify a ballot initiative to repeal the voting system just two years later. In a squeaker, voters opted to keep the system by just 743 votes.Opponents of the system — that is, supporters of a fairer and easier-to-understand voting system — have not given up their efforts to eliminate the confusing system. They’ve succeeded in qualifying another ballot initiative to reverse the decision to employ the ranked choice system. Voters will vote on it this year.THEY LIVED THROUGH SOCIALISM. HERE IS THEIR TERRIFYING WARNING TO AMERICAN VOTERSLet’s be clear: Alaska voters should mark their ballots for Daniel S. Sullivan, the incumbent senator, as their first choice and Daniel J. Sullivan, his similarly named challenger, as their second choice. And they should vote yes to end the ranked choice mess once and, hopefully, for all.Voters elsewhere should take note: When Democrats thump their chests and bellow about how they want to “maximize voter participation” and “make it easier to vote,” know they’re not telling the truth.Jenny Beth Martin is chairman of Tea Party Patriots Action.