FBI Contacts Donors of Alaska Senate Candidate Who Shares Name With Incumbent Dan Sullivan

The FBI on Friday began contacting donors to Dan J. Sullivan, a U.S. Senate candidate in Alaska who shares a name with Republican incumbent Dan S. Sullivan, asking about potential deception. Agents have reached donors in at least two remote Alaska communities and a couple in Massachusetts. An Anchorage-based agent visited a boat dealership in Petersburg, a fishing community reachable only by air or water, and left a card for Charles Flint, who gave $500 over the summer. Flint said the agent asked his son whether Flint felt misled; Flint said he did not and plans to rank Democrat Mary Peltola first. Federal officials have confirmed a criminal probe, and the Justice Department on Friday sought a court order to isolate certain Alaska ballots to examine potential voter confusion. Alaska's Republican governor ordered an official inquiry earlier this week. The New York Times reported that people tied to Peltola's campaign and Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee aides tried to recruit Dan J. Sullivan, a retired teacher. Peltola said Thursday she knew nothing of any other candidate.

The right-leaning New York Post headlines the story with the label 'Decoy Dan' and spells out the Alaska and Massachusetts donor contacts, while Newsmax uses the wire headline without a nickname. The left-leaning HuffPost runs the same Associated Press account, with the same lede and Flint's remarks that he feels no confusion. So the right and left share nearly identical facts, and the main difference visible is the New York Post's loaded-sounding nickname. BBC News, listed as alternative, takes a distinct angle: it leads with Peltola's denial, the governor's inquiry and the New York Times report, and notes the race is among the tightest of the midterms.