The real Sen. Sullivan is afraid to stand up

The U.S. Capitol. (Mike Litterst / National Park Service)

By Rich Moniak

I don’t doubt for a minute that Sen. Dan Sullivan is among the many colleagues of Sen. Lisa Murkowski who share her serious “apprehensions” about the terms in the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) President Donald Trump signed with Iran last week.

But even though Sen. Sullivan must be furious about America’s sworn enemy getting the better end of the deal, he’s only free to express such anger at his Democratic opponents. 

“The Democratic Party is talking about ‘we care about fair elections.’ “It’s bulls---," he angrily told Fox Digital News last month when asked about the Senate candidacy of Dan J. Sullivan. He then accused the party and Democratic challenger Mary Peltola of trying to “rig — I say very strongly — rig an election in their favor."

Dan J. Sullivan of Petersburg may have entered the race solely “for the purpose of confusing or misleading voters,” as Carol Beecher wrote in her decision to de-certify his candidacy. But as the Anchorage Daily News editorial board headline unintentionally implied, it’s our incumbent senator who has left Alaskans confused about what he stands for. 

For starters, Sen. Sullivan is afraid to tell us what he thinks of the MOU even though its terms favor the Iranian regime he absolutely despises.

Likewise, Trump’s irrationally applied, inflationary tariffs completely contradict the free trade idealism of the Sen. Sullivan who Alaskans elected in 2014.

We know that Sen. Sullivan likes to talk about defending the Constitution. But he hasn’t explained why he’s willing to let Trump usurp Congress’s constitutional power to declare war and regulate commerce with foreign nations. 

We no longer know where Sen. Sullivan stands regarding Russia’s unjust war against Ukraine. He frequently accused former President Joe Biden of not doing enough to help Ukraine. But he quietly tolerates Trump’s on-again-off-again bromance with Russian President Vladimir Putin that’s prolonged the destruction and misery in Ukraine. 

We don’t know what happened to the Sen. Sullivan who once took pride in his commitment to “combat sexual and domestic violence.” It was the “critical issue” which led him to withdraw his endorsement of Trump in 2016. But he was unmoved when reminded of the “reprehensible behavior” that offended him after a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing a magazine columnist.

In their rush to file a complaint against Dan J. Sullivan, the National Republican Senatorial Committee engaged in its own act of blatant hypocrisy. They accused him of attempting “a fraud on the Alaska election system.” Like Sen. Sullivan, the committee chair and its five vice-chairs have never condemned Trump’s attempts to fraudulently deceive American voters by endlessly ranting about the 2020 election being rigged.

Hypocrisy abounds in Beecher’s decision too. In 2024, she was fine listing Eric Hafner as a registered Democrat on the ballot for Alaska’s lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. That in itself wasn’t unusual. But it certainly must have confused voters who weren’t aware that Hafner was serving a 20-year prison sentence for making bomb threats and trying to extort government officials in New Jersey.

The fact that he’s still in prison didn’t keep her from putting him on the ballot this year. And in a slight twist to the two Sullivans story, his mother will be listed as a Democrat on the U.S. Senate ballot. Like her son, it’s the second time Carol “Kitty” Hafner is running for office in Alaska even though she’s never lived here. 

Neither Hafner has a chance of winning or being a spoiler in their respective races. 

And they won’t be flooding anyone’s mailbox or social media accounts with false accusations against their opponents.

That’s what Sen. Sullivan did in 2014. In an email to people following his campaign, he falsely accused then-Sen. Mark Begich of casting “the deciding vote in favor of President Obama’s authority to issue executive amnesty to illegal aliens." 

Now he’s calling ads attacking his positions on healthcare “a bunch of bull----.” One involves Medicaid funding and eligibility impacted by the One Big Beautiful Bill he supported. The other is about the Republican Party’s decision to let Obamacare subsidies expire. 

Sen. Sullivan is entitled to his opinion. But neither issue is as black and white as his dishonest attack on Begich. 

And anyone who is too afraid to speak out about the disasters and embarrassments that will be Trump’s lasting legacy doesn’t deserve the trust of Alaska’s voters. 

• Rich Moniak is a Juneau resident and retired civil engineer with more than 25 years of experience working in the public sector.